How To Get Out Of A Cellphone Contract Early

MyMoneyBlog has a very helpful article on how to get out of your cellphone contract early:

WikiHow has a good article on How to Get out of a Cellular Service Contract. While most of the methods involve smooth-talking your way out of the contract, they do point out my favorite way to get out of a cellphone contract: Wait for them to change your contract terms. This actually happens quite frequently, and Iâ€™ve done it successfully myself. In my case they raised the late payment fee from $25 to $39 or something like that. Theyâ€™ll bury this in your statement in tiny print, sometimes on the back of page 6 of 7 or something.

But the law says if they change your contract, you can either accept or cancel within 30 days. Cancel! This is perfectly fair as they are changing the rules on you! Note that they may cancel you that very second, so be prepared. In fact, I remember my conversation with Verizon Wireless like it was yesterday:

Me: It says with my statement that you are changing my contract so I can cancel without any fees.

Verizon CSR: Let me check. [pause] Yes, we raised the late payment fee. Have you ever had a late payment?

Me: Ummâ€¦ maybeâ€¦

Verizon CSR: Let me check. [pause] No sir, you have never made a late payment. This change will not even affect you. Do you really think itâ€™s fair that you are breaking your contract for something that doesnâ€™t even affect you?

Verizon CSR: Okay your account is cancelled as of immediately. Your phone will no longer work. Your number is gone. Your last bill will be prorated. Goodbye. [click]

And true to her word, my cell phone was dead that very second. No problem, I put it on eBay and got me a better deal elsewhere

Some of the other tricks seems more like long shots. Here are the two I think are the most likely to work:

Get off the grid. Study your providerâ€™s coverage map and find a town (maybe in Alaska?) with absolutely no service. Then tell the company youâ€™re moving there. Theyâ€™re not legally required to cut you loose, but frustrated consumers have reported success.

Get a lemon. Get a known problematic phone, complain 3 times, be let out of a contract due to your local lemon law.

250 Responses to “How To Get Out Of A Cellphone Contract Early”

I just recently moved and when I tried to change my number with Bell the guy on the phone wanted to charge me $35 to change it. When I went into the store they only charged me $15. Most of these companies are just trying to rip us off. I changed my finacees number for no charge with Telus. Why is it that one company can do it for nothing and another company charges you. When they told me of the charge I asked to cancel my contract and was told it would cost me $200, I just wish I had read this before I changed my number then I wouldn’t have to deal with them for 8 more months. Thanks for the info. Misty

We have a phone that was foisted on us on one of those Irresistable Special Offers, but it cannot receive a signal where we are, so it is almost never used. Other models from the same provider (Bell) work just fine from anywhere in the house, but not this one (Audiovox), and Bell won’t upgrade it, although they have offered to replace it … provided we call the office using the phone (the phone centre in the mall says they can’t do this) and we can’t call them because the phone doesn’t work; one would think there would be a consumer protection law against charging exorbitant fees for a service the customer cannot use, especially when the customer cannot tell in advance that the service cannot be used!

So I offered to move the account over to a phone I already had, a leftover after I’d upgraded my work phone on Rogers. “We just need a SIM chip and we’re done!” I told them. Now this I find dubious, but the no can do excuse we were given was this: “Bell does not use SIM chips in our phones. You can only use phones bought from Bell Canada” — so we can’t upgrade, we can’t replace, and we still can’t use the stupid thing.

Now how sleazy is that? Now, we can, of course, call them using the land line to return it, and that’s why the interest in the Lemon Law. Does Ontario have such a thing?

Hmmm … seems that wiki and their commentators are entirely concerned with US law — up here in Monopolyland, the rules could be very different; if any lawyers are reading this, can you post some clarifications for the Canuks?

It’s true.. no Bell phones use simcards, and Rogers (which in my opinion is a much better company) does. I have Bell (Don’t get me started), and I’ve had numerous problems, and BTW, if you have the feature Bell-to-Bell calling, it wasn’t working in November and December. There is no way for any customer to know this, because on their bill, it simply states “incoming call” (unless you remember hey! John Doe uses bell and that was him that called me at 3:13 pm 28 days ago.) I reported this to the Better Business Bureau, along with probably 6 other horrible issues. The BBB will do absolutely nothing, they sent Bell 3 letters on behalf of me, with no response. All the BBB will do for you is post on their website saying Bell doesn’t respond to letters.
I think it will be absolutely impossible for customers to get out of Bell’s contract. I highly doubt that anywhere in a cell phone contract in Canada it states if we change anything you can cancel. We all probably signed away on the dotted line, and somewhere hidden in the middle of the 11 page contract stated “Prices and services subject to change with out prior notice” or something like that.

A better idea is don’t do a contract or do at most a 1 year contract. Yes, you can have a cell phone in Canada without a contract. You do get a better discounts with a 2 or 3 year contract. But if your a first time cell phone user. Get a basic cheap phone, without a contract and get a rate plan that doesn’t require a contract. Mostly you wont get free nights just free weekends.

Help please,
Im trying to get out of a contract with bell mobility and not pay the ridiculous fee associated with this. I read this article about having 30 days to accept of cancel any changes that Bell makes to the contract. I noticed that on my last bill the price for 411 directory has increased. Would this give me grounds to cancel the contract. Maybe if there are any lawyers out there you could tell me where I can this law and if it does apply in this case.
Oh, and please dont post something saying that you should really use pay as you go rather than a contract, doesnt really help here. Thanks.

Just a tip, at Bell ExpressVu, if you are moving out of the country or to a non-serviceable area (a condo that cant have a dish), they will waive the term contract fee. As much as you complain about Bell, they still make accomodations and take more of a customer oriented approach then the other companies. Although you may experience a lot of screw ups, its due to the size of the company, and the bureacratic structure that there is too much red tape, hence such rigid policies and procedures that cannot get modified so easily.

in canada, the standard form contract law is somewhat similar to the us… the “law” about having 30 days to accept changes somewhat applies in that there is most likely a clause in your SFK that stipulates that they have to give you “notice” of a change and if you don’t agree with the change, you can cancel. It’s not always 30 days and sometimes “using” whatever product it is is considered “acceptance” of the change in terms. “Notice” of change in terms can be anything from a note in your bill to something buried deep in their website… look around the website for your terms of agreement and see what’s there.

I checked Telus’ Website and It says that they can make any changes and they give me 30 days to accept. They don’t say that I can cancel without paying a fee if I do not accept these changes. So If any one could tell me if that if I can cancel, it would great.

Telus just doesn’t cut it anymore
They are the last one’s to get the good phones and their customer service sucks … I’m pretty sure they just hired a bunch of 14 yr olds who know absolutely nothing about any problems/questions/concerns their customers have.

So please if anyone know’s if I can get out of my disgustingly renewed (for 2 more years) contract please let me in on it!

Moving to a non-service area doesn’t seem to work. I had a Fido phone in Toronto and move to a town in Saskathewan where ther wasn’t service. They didn’t care, still charged me 300 dollars to get out of my contract!

I can’t believe that moving to a non-service area won’t even work!! What does it take?? Do we have to send in fake death certificates??? It shouldn’t be this hard to get out of these crappy contracts – especially if THEY are the one’s making changes …

….argh… I ….. hate… Telus….
If I have to speak to another one of these “customer service reps” I will screammmmm. There is NO reason on a family plan that calls and texts to one another are not working! And since we are on a family plan this service is deemed free… well nice free service when it doesn’t work half the time!
I’m calling again in the morning … I have been calling in my complaints for over 4 weeks now.. I’m at a loss.. they buy out for each of our phones is $20 a month which is $400 for EACH phone … this is ridiculous
HELP anyone ….any ideas… seriously I will ride a moose over to their head office if you tell me it will work! lol

So, I would also like to know if we can get out of a Telus contract. They are soon changing the charge for receiving text messages… which is ridiculous… but anyways, with the new iPhone coming to Rogers, seems like the perfect time to jump ship.
Anyone know?? I don’t want to call and threaten just to have my phone cut off and have to wait until July to get a new one

Changing text messaging rates you say…hmmm interesting… I also want to switch to Rogers – they always get the newest phones!
Well after a month a weekly (sometimes daily) calling to telus about my NEW phone dropping calls and the other phone on our famliy plan’s text messages not going through …they FINALLY credited $50 for the hassle of me calling all the time …but they are STILL working on our Network problems… this is BULLLLLLL I should be able to get out of my contract since I’m paying them and only half of my service is working!!
Oh the fight is on…

Well now they’ve given us a $250 credit towards the purchase of a new PDA smartphone… I guess they think this will fix our network problems…. we shall see…
P.S. this is after a good month and a half of calling weekly (if not daily) about or crappy service.
I still would rather end our contracts and go elsewhere

I have been trying to get out of a contract with Rogers since April. Both phones I received no longer work. Just a warning about Rogers; Whenever you call in and make a change or upgrade to your plan they will add additional years to your contract without discussing it with you. They have also changed their fees so that it now costs $400 per phone to cancel.

I’ve heard that all companies are going to end up changing them .. for the worse.. I think they’ve realized it’s easier to send someone a 10 cent txt msg than phone them and waste valuable minutes… so they will get us where it hurts again :S

I agree with Cjurl….I had a similar experience with Rogers……when I was finally at the end of my contract….I told the CSR that I wanted out of my “life sentence” with Rogers. She laughed and thought I was kidding….and then proceeded to tell me that my contract had been extended because my husband had got a new phone to replace the crappy phone we got with our contract. Needless to say I was not happy and made it known….after I was transferred to about three different people, my contract was finally cancelled. Sweet, sweet freedom. Never again will I sign on for a cell phone contract. Monthly payments ended up being twice what they promised me, and half the time we didn’t have service because we live in Neverland in Northwestern Ontario.

I made an attempt at canceling my contract with Telus as a result of the change in text messaging charges.

I was referred to some kind of “higher up” rep who called me a couple days after getting nowhere with the original rep. He explained to me that SMS is an “additional service” that is not part of the “Monthly Rate” that I locked in for. Even though I wasn’t very happy with his explanation, I got sick of going in circles with him explaining to him that I consider SMS part of my “Monthly Rate”, because with out the Monthly Rate, I couldn’t use SMS. So, he got rid of me by giving me the Business Bundle ($10/month) for free for the rest of my contract.

I’d love to have the time to investigate this further, but unfortunately, I don’t

I am with telus, and my phone is a piece of junk. Half of the time i don’t get texts, or i have to turn my phone off and restart it to get texts. As well, it can not hold a charge. Like I said, useless.
I want to get out of my contract and try to get a lower fee.
I tried to get a new phone, but they are making me pay almost 300$. The guy talked about a Mid-Contract Deal, but when he went to put some of the things onto the computer, he told us we weren’t allowed the fee yet.
Its crap. How can I get out of my contract? I’m only a year in too.

apparently if you don’t have a texting bundle they will now charge you for any INCOMING text messages (first of all how is this right?? people can just text you a billion times and you get charged?!?!) Anyway so since they are changing your contract you apparently can get out of it that way – by not agreeing with their new texting charges- BUT it’s only if you don’t already have a texting/spark bundle – if you do then it doesn’t affect you it’s just free in those bundles.

Charging for incoming texts is disgusting. I can just see it now with a flood of unsolicitied texts. How can they get away with charging people who don’t have a texting bundle?
At least we have the option to opt out of telemarketing on the landlines; why should this be any different.

Can you imagine if there’s someone that doesn’t like you? They could send a zillion text messages and you’d be stuck with the bill?

I questioned that also robbie and Telus said that you can block senders if you would like – but still – you may end up not blocking them until after 50 msgs get through. All and all it’s a manipulative way to get you to buy their “spark bundles”

These service terms (including any rates and charges) may be changed unilaterally by TELUS from time to time on at least thirty (30) days’ notice to you, and such changes shall become effective once you use the service after such thirty (30) day period (which use shall be deemed conclusively to indicate acceptance of such changes.

We will not increase your basic monthly voice plan charge or out-of-bundle airtime charge during any Committed Service Period, as long as you remain qualified to receive your chosen plan and Services throughout the Committed Service Period. If you no longer qualify to receive a plan or the Services at the fees offered to you (for example, a corporate plan or employee plan, due for instance to termination of employment or termination of a corporate agreement) then Bell may transfer you to a comparable Service and plan, at the appropriate fees and charges for which you then qualify, and you accept same. During the Term we may increase other fees (including the System Access Fee), and charge additional fees, after giving you 30 days advance notice. Any promotional and upgrade offers are offered at our discretion for limited periods of time.

I made the “I might receive a ton of text message and I’d have no choice but to pay for them”. Telus’ argument to that was that SMS is an “additional service” that can be disabled to prevent text messages from coming in. It’s the customers choice to leave SMS enabled.

I’m giving Telus the benefit of the doubt in assuming that they would wave the fees for unsolicited messages before you got a chance to cancel SMS.

I have 17 long months left with telus and have been trying to get out of my contract for a month now. its gotten to the point that i call every day, speak to customer service for an hour and get nowhere

i got my current phone in december,
the battery had to be replaced three times in the first month because it would not hold a charge, telus would not send my phone away or consider the fact it might not be my fault this was happening.
i no longer get the reception i used to, and my phone has begun dropping calls.

on top of all this i have NEVER actually signed a physical contract. the phone was given to me as a gift and activated over the phone there is no possible way i could have signed anything. still telus tells me that by using the phone i have entered a binding legal contract.

im getting sick of dealing with customer service, who today told me that although my phone continues to break i shouldnt worry because it is under warranty until december meaning i will only have to pay to fix this stupid phone for the last twelve months of my contract. when i pointed this out i was basically told ‘too bad’ and that if i was having so much trouble they would offer me a 150 credit on my next phone with a three year contract.

this is where i laughed, told them they were crazy to think i will ever return to telus and then proceeded to hang up the phone.

if anyone has any idea what i should do please help me out here. i just want out of this ridiculous contract that i didnt even sign!!

Has anyone had success getting out of a Rogers contract? I was convinced by a customer service person in October 2007 to change to their “mega promotional plan”. I was not told at that time that I would now have to pay a $400 early cancellation fee instead of a $200 ECF. But they have recently changed my value pack to include “mobile backup” and I”m thinking of trying to get out of my contract for that. Any suggestions?

I have a Bell service and sending them following letter:
TERMINATION OF CONTRACT due to changes in terms of the contract.

Please, be advised that I am canceling a service contract with Bell Mobility due to violation of the â€œAGREEMENTâ€ and Bell mobility negligence to:
23. Changes to this Agreement and the Service. You agree that this Agreement and any fees, charges or other obligations and any features, options, or other aspects of the Services, may be modified, discontinued or terminated by Bell except as otherwise specified in this Agreement. We will notify you by providing at least 30 days advance notice of any change that affects you. Nothing in this Agreement shall be construed as obligating you to accept receipt of the Services after any change is made to this Agreement, the Services or otherwise; however, your sole remedy in the event of such a change shall be termination of the Services including the payment of any SAPA or DSAPA that may apply, upon providing 30 days advance written notice. Should you continue to receive the Services after such change is effective, you expressly agree that no additional written agreement or express acknowledgement shall be required to accept such change and, unless otherwise prohibited by law, you specifically waive any and all statutory requirements for notice and express acceptance of such changes except for those provided in this paragraph. You agree that you cannot change this Agreement and that no oral or written statement or representation of any sales agent, representative or employee of Bell made to you can change this Agreement.
Specifically service change â€œEffective August 8th, 2008, there will be a price change for text messaging only affecting pay per use text messaging usersâ€, which lawfully allows me to terminate contract with you â€“ Bell mobility as breach of our Agreement with no early termination fees.

I will “roll the ball” if they do not accept that. It will become a customer legal right war!
Are you with me?

I have a Bell service and sending them following letter:
TERMINATION OF CONTRACT due to changes in terms of the contract.

Please, be advised that I am canceling a service contract with Bell Mobility due to violation of the â€œAGREEMENTâ€ and Bell mobility negligence to:
_________________________________________________________
23. Changes to this Agreement and the Service. You agree that this Agreement and any fees, charges or other obligations and any features, options, or other aspects of the Services, may be modified, discontinued or terminated by Bell except as otherwise specified in this Agreement. We will notify you by providing at least 30 days advance notice of any change that affects you. Nothing in this Agreement shall be construed as obligating you to accept receipt of the Services after any change is made to this Agreement, the Services or otherwise; however, your sole remedy in the event of such a change shall be termination of the Services including the payment of any SAPA or DSAPA that may apply, upon providing 30 days advance written notice. Should you continue to receive the Services after such change is effective, you expressly agree that no additional written agreement or express acknowledgement shall be required to accept such change and, unless otherwise prohibited by law, you specifically waive any and all statutory requirements for notice and express acceptance of such changes except for those provided in this paragraph. You agree that you cannot change this Agreement and that no oral or written statement or representation of any sales agent, representative or employee of Bell made to you can change this Agreement.
__________________________________________________________
Specifically service change:
………….
â€œEffective August 8th, 2008, there will be a price change for text messaging only affecting pay per use text messaging usersâ€………,
which lawfully allows me to terminate contract with you â€“ Bell mobility as breach of our Agreement with no early termination fees.

I will “roll the ball” if they do not accept that. It will become a customer legal right war!
Are you with me?

i currently using bell.and i don’t like it. i the type of person that can not stick to one phone for 3 years, and i don’t want to pay hundreds of dollars just to buy their crappy phone. on top of that, their signals are terrible. at some places, i would not get ANY signals where rogers are having full. i wanted to get out of the contract, but just don’t know how. would the “incoming text msg” fee really works? i have read my contract over a few times and they said that they are allow to add additional rates in 30 days advance.

I have been with telus for 20 years – since from when they were clearnet and they have been great!!! i have a great plan and anytime i have called, they have accomodated my requests….. be persistent with them and tell them exactly what u wnat .

I’ve taken over looking at the bills for about a dozen phones. Rogers can be trying at times, especially when plans come and go.
But if you stay persistent then you will get what you want.
If the Rep that you speak to at first, doesn’t seem to be able to help you ask for a supervisor. Many times they CAN do what the poor 1st level rep couldn’t. And by all means, if you need to get our of a contract, wait for a change in the contract that you didn’t request.

Looking over the big 3 in Canada, here is what I see:

Telus Terms and Conditions – the simplest of them all

*** Doesn’t stipulate the cancellation fee!

11. Termination/Suspension of service

“Unless otherwise agreed, you may terminate your service at any time by providing TELUS with thirty (30) days’ notice. TELUS may suspend or terminate the service and this agreement at any time, without any notice or liability: if you fail to pay any amount when due (including any required deposit); if TELUS, in its sole discretion, considers you an unacceptable credit risk and you fail to provide a security deposit acceptable to TELUS; if you are in default under these terms and conditions or any other agreement between you and TELUS, a TELUS dealer or any assignee; or if TELUS reasonably apprehends the occurrence of any such events. If service is terminated for any reason, including a decision to port a number to another carrier, you will remain liable for all accrued fees and charges.”

They are tough. Section 3 outlines the cancellation fees, but doesn’t say how the customer can get out – only that Bell can get out at any time.

Section 23 is the customer’s loophole. Its pretty straightforward. Trouble is they don’t just ocme out and SAY that you can cancel with them IF they change anything and NOT get charged. They use the word “may” instead, implying that they still might charge you. But of course, they can’t. They voided the contract by changing something.

“Nothing in this Agreement shall be construed as obligating you to accept receipt of the Services after any change is made to this Agreement, the Services or otherwise; however, your sole remedy in the event of such a change shall be termination of the Services including the payment of any SAPA or DSAPA that may apply, upon providing 30 days advance written notice.”

If you thought Bell’s Terms and Conditions were a tough read, try the Roger’s Small Business Terms and Conditions:

“Unless otherwise set out in the Materials, if you agree to subscribe to one of our plans or Services for a committed period of time (the “Committment Period”) you may be subject to and early cancellation fee (ECF) for each service.”

So there it is. “May be subject”. So its NOT set in stone.

While Bell states, that if THEY cancel the contract, because, for example, you were RUDE to their service REPS (or abusive – now who would do a thing like that?), you would have to pay their SAPA (termination fee) fee. Rogers doesn’t say that:

Section 40 (The bastards posted the agreement as a PDF so I can’t even copy and paste)

If we restrict, block or terminate your services or accounts:
You must pay all applicable late fees
Your access to emergency, or special needs services may also be restricted, blocked or terminated
You will return all equipment to Rogers

Nothing about a termination fee

Section 45

This is a funny one. I think that Rogers copied Telus (or was it Bell?). They state:

“The Service Agreement enures to the benefit of and is binding on you, Rogers and on your and Roger’s respective successors and assigns.”

Yeesh! They probably meant to say “endures”. Then one idiot copied the other website and we have the following meaning:

“You and your successors are forever bound to this contract. But fear not. You will eventually get used to this “self induced proclamation of slavery”, because it will repeat itself endlessly, everytime you call us to make a slight change. In the end it really is to both yours and Rogers benefit (mostly Rogers) that it does last forever.”

I picked up a Bell solo contract in Ottawa, 35 as month, talk and text package, ended up paying around 50 a month. I moved, put the phone on ‘standby’ paying $17.50 a month for the last 9 months, as I cannot change to a local number where I moved. They don’t have an office here, and can only offer a ‘free long distance’ after 7pm for 45 a month, BUT if anyone local was to phone me, they would HAVE to pay a long distance charge. Now they offered me a 300 buy-out of the contract!!! or i continue to pay 17.50 a month for the unused phone.

Dissapointed big time because Solo will do NOTHING to help me. All they want is the MONEY, and don’t care how they get it. The Motorola Q i have is outdated and sucks up batteries. Not happy with my situation, and can only blame MYSELF for NOT reading the fine print, the cancellation clause, ALL the fine print.

now Solo just sits back and laughs at me, while i am billed monthly, with a totally unusable phone, in an area where I cannot even get a local number.

Warning to ALL potential cell phone subscribers, DO NOT BE IN ANY HURRY, BE AWARE OF ANY SPECIAL DEALS OR HOOPLA, and DO YOU REALLY NEED a CELL TO BEGIN WITH????

I currently have a Rogers family plan with two phones. I have no reception where I live. They say this is my problem and will not let me out of my contract. I would like to switch to another carrier. If someone out there has a similar plan, on another carrier, I would happily trade with them. Thank you.
Eugene.

I was a great customer with Telus for 8 years paying $50-150 per month. Last year my phone broke and I took it to a Telus store and asked for a new phone but because my contract wasn’t up they wouldn’t help me, I had to purchase a new phone. When my contract was over so I decided to transfer my cell phone number to Vonage as a virtual number and cancel my cell phone. As it turns out, Vonage was very effecient and transffered my number almost immediately. I called Telus a week later to cancel my account but they informed me that the account had been automatically canceled when I switched my number, I asked for my balance, paid it and thought I was finally done with Telus. The next month I received a bill for $100, when I called to ask why, I was told it was a cancellation fee and as it turned out, I had canceled 2 days early. I offered to pay for the 2 days but they said no and I am now in collection with Telus for $100 which I will NEVER PAY!

I don’t understand why someone hasn’t already started a facebook group regarding the terrible service from Bell Mobility.

To boot, we are treated like lemons. Why? Because in this day and age when cell phones are no longer a novelty, we should NOT be charge for any local calls ever.

Bell Mobility is a brutal company that is ripping us off.
Bell Mobility charges for Local Calls when this type of charge should be erased from all their services charges. It’s totally about time.
Bell Mobility should die hard to other cell phone companies by way of: if the other company wants your loyalty, they should buy out your cancellation ‘Penalty”.
Bell Mobility treats us as if we are not human in the sense that we, as paying and very unhappy customers, if we cannot pay due to losing our job or something, we have to pay the “Pentaly”. Bell Mobility is telling me, a loyal customer that I am going to be Penalized!?
Bell Mobility treats it’s customers as second class citizens.

When will people realize that we are people and not lemons and stop signing contracts with companies like Bell Mobility who Penalize their customers?

Start a facebook Group, get thousands and hopefully millions of people to join and put an end to Bell Mobility and their way of treating us like lemons.

I have a Bell cell phone and I am one year into a 3 year contract. Last Dec I was laid off of my job (carpenter) and so after finding no job in the ensuing weeks, I decided to go out on my own, ie” start my own small carpentry business. With this in mind I went into my local Bell store (coquitlam center, bc) to upgrade my sanyo flip phone to a blackberry storm- fully prepared to sign onto an extention or a whole new contract! talked to the guy, he said my options were to buy a storm for $699.00… ???? and some confusing stuff about getting a $50 credit next December. I said to him that it would be cheaper for me to cancel with Bell ($400) and walk across the mall to either telus or Rogers and buy a blackberry bold for $250.00 thereby saving myself %50… He said “yes” ???????????? wow, double wow- do they not have a pr department?? I sent an email with this situation to Bell, and I got back a reply in part copied here:Upon full review of your email, I wish to inform you that although you are entitled to purchase a new unit at full price, the Hardware Upgrade Loyalty Credit cannot be applied due to your recent hardware upgrade on (April 6th, 2008) for which credits have already been applied.Â Rest assured that you can become eligible at any time.Â You may communicate with us at a later date in order to verify your eligibility.If you wish to upgrade your phone at this time, you have two alternatives.Â You may purchase a compatible phone at a regular price without restarting your existing contract, or you may purchase a used phone, compatible with our network, from a third party vendor.

HA! I wanted to sent them a two word reply to this I didn’t- yet. my “hardware upgrade” was a downgrade!!! I had an htc touch, which didn’t last a week- it had two “grand mal” siezures, and serious bettery problems – so I downgraded to a sanyo flip.

I have to wonder if they are unfocussed on customer relations – here I was wanting to upgrade my phone and extend/renew my contrat- all they can do is say “too bad so sad”

Man if one of my customers was willing to pay to get away from me I’d be very concerned!!! and jump through hoops to fix whatever is wrong.

I will prob. just pay them the $400 and walk down to rogers- they have a situation where you can upgrade your phone each year- with a contract extention/renewal or something like that.

I have been reading everything that has been written and I have one question….

If you got out of your contract, who would you switch too? Seem like everyone has problems with all cell phone providers. I’m with Telus (been for 3 years) and never had problems, or anything that would make me want to switch. I ever so want an iPhone (and in 2-3 years Telus will have it, I just got to hold on) but am not willing to switch to Rogers and as for Bell….. nothing but bad serves, everyone I know gets dropped calls.

20. Except for Equipment that you have fully paid for, all Equipment (including the Gateway) installed or
provided by us remains our property and you agree that:
• you will take reasonable care with such Equipment;
• you may not sell, lease, mortgage, transfer, assign or encumber such Equipment; and
• you will return such Equipment to us at your own expense upon termination of the Services.
If such Equipment is lost, stolen or damaged or sold, leased, mortgaged, transferred, assigned,
encumbered or not returned, you agree to pay us the undiscounted retail value of such Equipment,
together with any costs incurred by us in seeking possession of such Equipment.

it say this i my contract so if i give the stuff back i should be out of my con tract right

The saga continues- and ends! Earlier in this blog I wrote about my problems with Bell, and how they didn’t want to accept my business ie: upgrade to a new phone with a more expensive contract.

Last friday in our local paper I found a pull out flyer for Rogers, advertisng a small business plan – 100 extra day time minutes and a $50 credit.
down I went! the phone prices had changed, they used to be $250 but now they were $200. Set up was a breeze, thought that I was going to have to pay the full $200 but wait there’s more! LOL seems that Rogers failed to notify the dealers of the new prices, and armed with my flyer I got the old price! I know this doesn’t make sense! the salesguy is a buddy of a buddy- so I got (originally) offered a BB Bold for 150 bucks. Somehow, and I’m not exactly sure how this worked, he applied the plan credit of $50 and then the original offer of $50 off… then threw in the car charger hehehe well out the door for $267. 49 for the phone, taxes etc. and a 200$ deposit- I had changed the name of my company in January so it doesn’t yet have a credit history, so I put down a $200 deposit, which will be applied to my account in a year.
I still have to pay out my Bell contract, but I got such a good deal that I am not worried about that.

hey folks… getting out of a telus contract seems to be impossible. I have harassed them to the extreme, arguing for an hour multiple times a week until the customer service rep gets pissed and hangs up(i like to argue), then i call back and complain to a manager about that service rep being rude(hahaha…). Then i learned that if i use my data phone for tethering it doesn’t count under my unlimited data plan…. so what did i do?? i used it for tethering anyways and then when i got insane $400 charges on my bill, i called telus and argued with them saying i had NO idea what tethering is and they fucked up somehow and i demand a rebate… well i have been doing this for the past 5 months now. and every 25th of the month when i get my bill there is a charge, so i *611 them and tell them they fucked up and im getting fed up with having to call every single month cause they cant seem to get my bill right and i want to change providers…. hahaha…. and EVERY time i get credited MORE than the full amount… they add an extra billing credit of $50 for my inconvenience (i have been with them for 9 years)and having to call them all the time! so i have had a data phone with unlimited data and everything else i could want for about $30/month including tax and that awesome “system access fee”(screw people out of $7 fee, more like it)! i plan on fucking with them until i can escape my contract because they keep “screwing up my bill”, or my contract is up. I am sick and tired of having a service provider that has shitty phones and wont give me a cell upgrade unless i sign on for 3 more years… at NEW contract and service plan pricing. they refuse to give me unlimited data for $30/month if i re sign with them… so f-them. i plan to move to rogers and get an iphone. rogers already offered me a wicked deal to switch over to them from telus. IF YOU ARE WITH TELUS….. go talk to rogers(call them)… they will try and buy you away from telus.. rogers seems to have a hate on for telus.. so use it to your advantage to get free/cheap stuff!! GOOD LUCK PEOPLE!

I just renewed my contract with Telus for 3yrs for a BB Storm. The monthly rate is good, but the phone SUCKS! It freezes on me, the accelerometer goes all wacky at times, when you lose signal and get back in an area with coverage, you have to shut the phone off and on to get a signal (this is a PAIN when you live in the city and take subways all over the place.

And on top of that, before I purchased the phone, I asked the customer service rep about any reported problems and he said that they originally had a lot of problems with lagging, etc. but now the phone has the new updated software on the phone, it works fine. I also asked about stuff like youtube usage, he said it’s good and covered under my data plan.

Now that I have the phone, it lags, battery life is pathetic, freezes, camera goes on without me touching it, same deal with voice command, it can’t link to a Mac (unless you have the new Leopard OS, it DOESN’T support youtube AND I find out that Telus doesn’t have multimedia messaging on any of their smartphones. What really bothered me about this is that my deal with Telus was unlimited texts of any kind, and now I find out that there is no such thing unless it’s just straight SMS.

After one week I got a swap ticket and had to re-input ALL my information (contacts, schedule, etc) on the new Storm I was given. Now I’m having the same problem with my second Storm and all they said they could do was offer me another Storm, that I will have to re-input all my information again on.

Is there any way I can get out of this contract with Telus> They neglected to tell me the inferiorities of the Storm and I’m having recurring problems. Telus said I could switch to a Curve, but I wanted 3G coverage and the new BlackBerry OS. This isn’t the first time Telus screwed me over, but I thought I was getting a good deal, so I stuck it ouBut now I feel helpless. Is there anything I can do to get out of their 3-year clutch without paying the ridiculous $700 cancellation fee (which costs MORE than the phone itself if I were to originally buy it without a contract)?

Sneaky just keep taking it back – I had to do that with my new Blackberry – it took three tries in order to get a good one – and since it’s their product that sucks they transfer all your contacts and data over for free – you shouldn’t be having this problem – perhaps it’s your local Telus store that’s the problem ..???

Okay, good news: I GOT OUT! My second Storm within the 14-day return period was malfunctioning so I got it swapped again. I told te sales associate that if this phone messes up on me again, what can be done? They kept trying to push the Curve on me and I didn’t want that. I told them I signed up to a three-year contract for the Storm, not the Curve.

I told him that I don’t want to leave Telus, (I’ve been there for four years) I just want a phone that works. I offered to go back to my old phone and take a year contract. At the end of that time, I’ll be able to get the new BlackBerry when it comes out for Telus. He said that’d be fine with him but Client Care has to approve it first. So I took the third Storm I have within two weeks and left.

Later in the evening I called Client Support and asked for Client Loyalty directly. Before I started talk to her, I made sure I got her name and extension, and took notes on exactly what we discussed with the date/time/etc. (a practice I will do from now on recomended by my lawyer). She was being a hardass bitch trying to tell me that I’m legally binded to the three years and RIM has a year warranty for the phone they aren’t responsible for.

I told her that I wanted to go back to my phone and waive the cancellation fees, because they phone they provided me three times within the two-week return period is not working and I don’t want any other phone they are offeing me. Eventually she said it’s up to the store. I told her that the store told me it was up to her. She ended up calling the store while I was on hold. She came back on the line telling me that she couldn’t get in touch with them and their mailbox is full (which telecommunications provider has a full mailbox??!) so she told me she’l leave notes on my account on what we talked about and to go to the store.

I immediately went to the store and told them the situation. I wasn’t a dick about it. I kinda played the helpless victim that wants to co-operate, but is stuck with a crap phone. The sales associate was nice. He said he’s fine with it as long as Client Loyalty is. He called Client Loyalty and gave me the phone immediately. After passing the phone back and forth a few times I eventually got a full refund on the phone along with the leather case I bought separately, got my number ported over to my old phone AND I’m only on a month-to-month. I asked about charges, etc. He saidthere’s no charges at all. Basically, it’s like I never owned the Storm.

Tomorrow, my ass is jumping over to Rogers for the Bold! I’m only doing a year contract though. I learned my lesson.

My previous phone was the HTC touch with Telus. I also had some of the same problems listed above.. text msgs not going through, lost service, hard resets every other day. I complained to telus almost daily until they gave me another phone – refurbished of course. This phone came with a whole new set of problems. I began complaining right away and was given another swap phone. Again problem after problem. I quickly learned that if you ask to speak to a manager enough times you will be passed to “The Escalation Department”. Although they may not fix your problem they will offer you free services.

When all was said and done I have free text msg’ing for 3 years, free call display and voicemail for 2 years and they offered me a $350 credit on the purchase of a Blackberry.

At that point I wanted anything but the HTC touch so this was a good option. I have had no problems with my Pearl and on top of having a good phone my phone bill is CHEAP!

Moral of the Story: Any persistant problems with Telus, speak to the escalations department and explain that you are not satisfied with the service they are providing. You may not get out of your contract but will be happier while you are still in it!

I worked for a Telus dealership and some people are not aware of this, but when you have your phone sent in for repair and they send you another one, it’s not a brand new phone they give you, it’s refurbished so in most cases you will continue to have problems with it becaus eit’s been broken before and they just keep repairing

I have had the same account for many many years with bell mobility.My husband has had a separate # on that same account. Never two contracts. Recently we got fed up with the service and we got my husband a separate phone with a different company. Trying to cancel the entire contract, surprise, surprise we were told we had two separate contracts that expire at different months and different years!!!!!! Nonetheless we asked to cancel just the same. We could only cancel after $300 and I think $100 penalties each respectively. Hours were spent on calls to Bell. NOTHING happened. A very nice employee at one of their offices told me to call the Loyalty office and based on the years we had Bell for home phone, cells x 5 when my kids were still home, satelite, sympatico, I should be helped at least to get out or reduce the contract to the minimum. NO LUCK AND NO SUCH THING AS LOYALTY counts WITH THEM.

Bottom line I am paying something like $60 monthly plus whatever else their dear heart desires for the month plus the new phone for my husband. I was told to call them back on April 11th in order to cancel mine that comes up for renewal in June and my husband’s is up in 2010 so I will continue to pay for nothing.

It just dawned on me that April 11 is this Saturday and I am sure if I call them after the Easter weekend I will be told I was late.
Calling earlier it seems like an unacceptable option which I am willing to risk.
So this is my story and I wish to god that the systems that exist in Europe would be brought into Canada also. The people there only use mobile phones to even contact their business because it is cheaper. They never pay for incoming calls and their outgoing cost very little. Go figure eh?

My sp. had a contract with Fido in Edmonton but when he moved to southern Alberta he was told they couldn’t provide him with a local number he would have to cancel with a fee. We were then informed by family that they had read if you signed up with Rogers (owned by Rogers i heard) they would waive the $300 cancellation fee.

We tried it out, and it worked. He signed up for a 3 years with Rogers, got his local number and his Fido account was canceled with a prorated last bill.

I have been sitting here reading all the great experiences everyone has had with different companies and I can sooooo sympathize. I have been with Telus for about 8 years now and I never had a problem until we decided to get a phone for my husband about 2 years ago. We got him his phone with the 3 year contract(first mistake)and within a month i quit working..No Problem..They were nice enough to switch it for another.After 4 times this kinda got to be tooo much.We talked to the oh so wonderful customer service people and they let us change to a new model.By now about 6 months have gone by and i just want to shove the phones where the sun doesnt shine but at this point im still being polite.The new phone worked great for about 4 months then it too died.At this point i just gave him my phone and told him to enjoy! Can you believe it died too after only 2 days? Now he joined the war against the customer service department and told them we no longer wanted their Mike service.They refused to do anything for us but repair the phones with a fee to us.He told them that we had no problem at all getting them fixed and leaving the phones on a call to one another(free service)for the duration of the contracts if they refused to cancel without a fee. Apparently they dont want you doing that! They offered free pcs phones for the both of us on whatever plan we wanted.The downfall of this was another 3 year contract.That was 1 year ago.Now my husbands phone died again.I went to the store today and told them i want to cancel.We call customer service from the store and i got this little shit on the phone who took great pleasure in pissing me off.I must say i was nowhere near polite.I was told i would be forced to pay a $973 cancellation fee.When i requested a supervisor the little ass told me that i couldnt speak to one because it would be rude of him to go interupt one while they were on the phone.At this point i called him a fucking retard and demanded a supervisor imediately. I was told no..That little peckerhead kept me on the phone for over 45 minutes while customers inside the store listened to me fight with him in disgust.I finally hung up on him and my husband called back to someone who offered to send us another phone due to our loyalty to the company.In the meantime we had my husbands number changed to my phone so he can work in the morning.I hate telus with a passion and i think after easter we will be driving to the head office in scarborough to deal with this matter.

I’m hoping that someone can help me re a Fido problem. My daughter signed a 3 yr contract with Fido in almost 2 years ago. She didn’t pay her bill for 2 months and they cut off her service (fair enough). She got a bill yesterday for service for the upcoming month with “call display/name display’, 100 text messages’, 911 emergency access’, and ‘system access fee’. She has no service. Shouldn’t they just be charging for the basic $30.00 service that she contracted for? Any guidance that you can provide would be appreciated.

Let me preface this by saying that I curse the major Telcos every time I switch on one of their products, pretty much. I stick with them mainly out of reliability (at least when Rogers screws up, I can force someone to listen to me, unlike some fly-by-night operation), even though I know they’re taking far more than they should from me.

However I kind of agree with the CSR in the original post. Yes, they are legally obliged to comply, and did so. But it’s not really fair, is it? The law is there to prevent someone from locking you into a contract and then raising the price and keeping you there, like a bait n’ switch. It just strikes me as morally suspect when someone signs a contract, gets what the contract specifies, and then tries to break it with little technicalities that don’t even affect them. It’s one thing if they change someone major that affects you, rather than one little line item that maybe costs you 1c, so you can go “aha, you screwed up, I’m free!”. I don’t think any of us would like it if our cable and phone providers all started cutting us off whenever we didn’t pay on time (and then charging reconnection fees). It’s kind of like a home buyer who makes an offer, gets cold feet, and then says “oh the home inspector said there’s one electrical socket that needs replacement, therefore it fails and I’m not buying”. Know what you’re signing up for, and unless they don’t give you that, man up! Remember in the long run, every time someone successfully “screws the man”, he just charges everyone else more… we all know they’re never going to let their profits take a hit for it.

I’ve been with Telus for 2 years and I haven’t had a problem until now. When my free data plan expired and I was charged over $250 they waived it for me no problem. When I called inquiring on a cheaper data than the $45 and I was told it wasn’t offered in conjunction with my talk plan, I got a call 2 days later saying they’d offer it to me for $30. I was impressed. I have a blackberry pearl and I have 23mos left in a 3yr contract and I noticed I have a $150 credit towards any data phone so I called cause I want to get the blackberry curve (not the new that Rogers has – the 8330 I believe) You know what the chick told me. It will cost me $400. They’re charging me the retail price minus the $150 credit to renew my contract!!!! WTF!?!?! I really hate how these companies treat their existing clients. There’s always great deals when you’re a new client looking to switch companies but you have to fight tooth and nail to get a decent deal. It’s friggin’ unbelievable. If anyone has any suggestions, please let me know!

I am currently on Rogers in Saskatchewan. I still have about 16 months on my contract. I have never received any notification of contract change despite the ECF changing from a maximum of $200 to a maximum of $400. I need out. I regularly travel and anywhere on the highway outside of major centres I have no service. Basically, if I run into car trouble on the road, I cannot call for help. I often travel north of Prince Albert and once outside of the city limits, service drops off.

Unless otherwise specified in the Service Agreement, we may change, at any time, any charges, features, content, programming, structure or any other aspects of the Services, as well as any term or provision of the Service Agreement, upon notice to you. If you do not accept a change to the Services, your sole remedy is to terminate the Service Agreement and the Services provided under the Service Agreement, within 30 days of your receipt of our notice of change to the Services (unless we specify a different notice period), by providing us with advance notice of termination pursuant to Section 31. If you do not accept a change to these Terms, your sole remedy is to retain the existing Terms unchanged for the duration of the Commitment Period (as defined below), upon notice to us within 30 days of your receipt of our notice of change in the Terms.

So yeah, eff them – they’ve changed their ECF and now incoming texts are going to be charged if you don’t have a text plan (I don’t) so I’m going to be calling and getting out of my lame ass contract.

PS – they have also been charging my husband and I (on 2 different plans) different amounts for Call Display. FRAUD!

I have a family share plan and the 3rd phone we have on the plan never ever gets used, there’s 1 year remaining on the other 2 phones and 2.5 remaining on the 3rd phone. Any suggestions for how we can just get that 3rd phone dropped?

I have Rogers. I tried yesterday to get out of it with the incoming new text fee. I was not able to according to them because there is a fee to cancel even though it does not state that on page 2 of my statement.
I did advise them that it says “If you do not accept a change to these Terms, your sole remedy is to retain the existing Terms unchanged for the duration of the Commitment Period (as defined below), upon notice to us within 30 days of your receipt of our notice of change in the Terms.”. Which means I will not be paying for incoming texts for the remainder of my contract (Jan 2010). I had to talk to 4 different people (Very frustrating).

Contracts Suck – can’t think of a way to get out, but at least cancel one of the one-year-left phones when you can and use the 2.5 one instead. at least you’ll only be paying for 2 phones at that point.

has anyone tried Koodo? i think i’m going there when my telus contract is up, i just need to know that the coverage is good and the call quality as well. (i’m in Toronto.)

I’m 9 months into a 3 year contract with Fido, my plan offered 2000 mins of calls but only in the GTA; Fido’s idea of the greater Toronto Area isnt very big. I dont even live in the GTA now but that is the least of my concerns. Fida have sent me a bill for at least double what i should be paying every month since i signed the contract. for 9 months i have had to call Fido and spend an hour or more having them correct the bill; for 9 months i have recived harassing phone calls and texts from Fido demanding money for a service i never agreed to.

So this month i havnt paied the bill, i have wrote Fido letter Notifying them that I consider the contract breached and that I am exercising my right to cancel the agreement in accordance with unfair business practice(s) as described in the Consumer Protection Act, 2002.

I use to work for bell. and I know a way to get out of their contracts with out a cancellation penalty.
If you call customer service and you say you are moving to an address that bell’s network doesn’t cover they will adjust the cancellation fee.
Just go on their website look bell.ca/coverage, and find a place where bell has low/no signal and say you are moving to that address, and they will call tech to make sure they have no signal and then they will cancel your contract without 30 day notice and waive the cancellation fee….
try that.. it might work for you.

Hmm Wish I saw this back in November. I had a Blackberry pearl (loved the phone no probs with it) through Telus. I had the phone not even 3 months when my place was broken into and my cell phone was stolen. I immediatly phoned telus to suspend my service. They couldn’t offer me ANYTHING wanted me to give them 500.00 for a replacement phone and to pay my current bill which I had not recieved yet (I for one do not have 620.00 laying around) Paid my account right up and tried to change my plan because i had another telus phone i could use temporarily but it wasnt a “smartphone” They refused to change my plan stating I agreed to the 3 yr term…
I was happy with my phone and my service up until then. Then it was like yeah we can’t do nothing for you sorry cough up the 500 for another smartphone. I havent gotten another phone since.

Does anyone know if there is a 2 week comsumer services protection law in Canada, or where it could be found? A week ago I Started a 3 year plan with telus on a Samsung Omnia(Piece of shit) at the time the sales rep told me I had two weeks decide if I like it. My service cuts in and out at home and when I tried to take it back they told me I only had two weeks to exchange my phone, and I was locked in to the contact.

I can’t believe we’ve all been suckered in like this. When my Rogers contract expires…in 2 years…I’m opting for pre-paid. As it stands right now, you have a contract for a certain monthly amout but additional fees and unexpected roaming charges, etc. crop up and before you know it your $25 per month fee has increased to almost $70 or more!! I’ve been with Rogers since 1995. Even the Customer Rep remarked on how long I’ve been a mobile customer. I will definitely go the pre-paid route when my contract expires….because I’ll be damned if they think I’m paying the $400 cancellation fee!!

Hi, I have had so much trouble with Rogers that I can’t get into it. But what I can do is provide you with this the CCTS, if you have a real problem with any cellular, isp or land based telecommunications provider look up the Commissioner for Complaints for Telecommunications Services Inc. (CCTS)http://www.ccts-cprst.ca/en/ only way to deal with the big guys. They will deal with the BS for you and can actually come to a binding agreement.

I’m with Bell. I just read everyone’s post. I was going to head into the store to pursue my situation, but I’m quite deflated now. I had good service and coverage in Alberta…UNTIL…my phone broke (still under extended warrenty) and they sent back something totally different. The reception is terrible and I have a buzzing in the earpiece. No one will rectify the situation. I am expected to purchase a new phone and extend my contract even though I was not informed that I would be sent this different P.O.C phone!
Unbelievable…where is our protection.
How can Bell can deliver such bad customer service and that’s not considered breaking the contract on thier end of the agreement?

Ok so Ive been with Telus for almost 5 years and within that time Ive had 7 phones. Every phone I get from them breaks or their text messaging service was down for 3 months..(its always something)…now Ive tried to be coopertive…Ive even accepted some refurbished phones just to humour them. Now its just ridiculous. I have NO patience left whatsoever. Not for the lady who called and tried to tell me how “alike” we were…and not for the “bad cop” who called me and tried to intimidate me into taking another refurbished phone. LOng story short–i stopped using my phone! yup thats right. I havent paid the bill in the last 3 months…and I know thats wrong…and they will probably send me to collections. BUT I CANNOT DEAL WITH THEM ANYMORE!!! does anyone know if there is any loopholes in their terms that can get me out of their contract? the moving thing doesnt work…and its not even about my plan anymore. help meee!!!

Friends don’t let friends do Rogers. Been with Rogers for 7 years.When I first started I was a very happy customer.After the first 4 years the customer service started going down hill.I lost a phone and called them up too report it and see about getting another one.This is were I saw them for the crooks they are.they offered to sell me a phone that was turned in for around a hundred bucks(they got it handed in so free to them)They told me what kind of phone it was so I headed of to a store to take a look at my potencial new phone.Their I discovered I could purchas it as a payas you go brand new for 5 bucks less. I called them up to let them know about this and they offered to let me upgrade early instead but I had to agree to a new 3year sentance. I did and all was good for another year. then when I was eligable for another upgrade I went down got me a sony w580 biggest heap of crap ever, and I got suckerd into an extended warranty. When the screen broke I took it back to the store where I bought the warranty cause it was just over a yearthinking the’d fix it.Wrong they said because it’s the screen too bad sucker your problem not ours even though there was a list of other problems with the phone.I’m on a family plan cause I wanted too keep my old phone going too use at work.And thats where new problems started. I tried too lower the plan on the busted phone to the lowest possible rate but they said no it’s either none or both. So for a year now I’ve been using a 3 year old beat up motorola with a busted ringer only vibrates.Paying around $120 a month for it,Rogers respose is sign another comitment and get a new phone.NO THANKS. Just signed a contract with bell unlimited free text call display call waiting evenings weekends nice free LG phone $40 a month. Now I call rogers too drop both my plans too there lowest rate plans for the remainder of my contract they said no only will drop it if I renew my contract.drop all my features each phone is now $37 a month for nothing friggan crimanals. A year left and I’m out or $20 a month per phone cancellation fee.Crooks!.

I’ve been with telus about 10 years (since it was clearnet) back and forth between Mike and PCS and I’ve never been happy with the service, but never trusted either of the other 2 companies…
I don’t know what I’m going to do but I want out….I’ve read everything on this page and still found no answer on how to get out….
The following is a direct quote from a letter telus sent me last month.

Telus – Important notice about TELUS standard mobility service terms

6. No warranties
To the fullest extent permitted by law, the service is provided on an “as is” and “as available” basis. Your use of the service is at your sole risk. TELUS does not guarantee timely, secure, error-free or uninterrupted service or receipt of material or messages transmitted over or through the TELUS networks or the networks of other companies or in respect of the Internet. The service may fail or be interrupted for reasons including, but not limited to, enviromental conditions, technical limitations, defects or failures, limitations of the systems of other telecommunications companies, emergency or public safety requirements, or causes beyond TELUS’ reasonable control. To the fullest extent permitted by law, TELUS disclaims all warranties and conditions (express, implied or statutory) relating to the service and any equipment.

I’m not a lawyer, but if I had to guess I’d say the above states that if you’re using a phone from Telus and it never works for a single second, too F’ing bad….you’ve paid for it so it’s your problem.
Good luck getting out of a contract with those terms in place.

NNNNNNNOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
Stay away from Rogers people do your selves a huge favour and STAY AWAY! You’ll be charged for calls you don’t make and they will insist you did… and if you live close to the US border then you’ll be charged for calling the US when you are calling a local number!

I joined telus in 2005, had my phone for about a year and it just stopped working properly.. text didnt go though battery wouldnt hold its charge ect… ok so what do I do? I talk to the telus rep and they say good news! you have accumulated a 99 or 150 dollar credit you can use to replace your current phone… oh, ok well I cant afford to get something better so the credit sounds good. Great here is your new phone, just sign here , its a formality, just states that your 3 year term starts again.. huh? Thats the only way you can use your credit.. oh.. well ok.

Few months later this phone dies the same way so I contact telus… after a bit of me harassing them via phone they agreed to send me a replacment phone.. oh , great thank you. Little did I know they once again re upped my contract.. I didnt even sign anything… I found this out when I went to get a phone to replace the replacement phone. Why do they all die on me .. no fault of my own.. really I dont drop my phone more then off the couch or coffee table.. and I have never ever gotten my phone wet.. the little sensor thing even says that.

I had the replacement phone for a few months.. maybe like 6 or so.. I cant remember, all I know is that I had to once again re up my stupid contract in order to redeem my credit.. hmm maybe it was a year.

So once again I started my 3 year contract. and In april I once again had to replace my phone because again it died.. I think I send out an energy that kills them…

I use my avalible credit to get a $99 pos phone. Soooo Its September now and I have been fighting with Telus for about 20 or so days trying to at least get some credit in order to buy a better phone then I normaly can afford. I try to explain that if my phones didnt keep dying I would have accumulated enough credit to get a good phone.

The sweet sweet fucktard on the end of the line with telus.. oh I had to wait 2 weeks to get ahold of someone from customer service because their system was down. He informs me that its not his problem that I cant afford a phone that I want.. Um gee thanks so much.

I tried everything , this was the supervisor.. I asked straight for him I asked about the loyalty program I asked about anything and everything and I get nothing but the comment that the phone is still under warranty and to send it in for repair. I ask what do I do if it comes back and stops working again.. he says well then you send it in again. I say doesn’t that sound a little inconvenient to you? He says thats policy.

After basicaly being told that I was doing everything wrong and everything was my fault and I suck.. well I politly hung up on him and cried..yup I cried because the fact of the matter is that I can not afford to buy out of the contract and I cant afford to get a better phone.

It pisses me off that these asses have the ability to give people credit any time they want but if they dont want to or I dont pay a big enough bill then why help me.
I have been in a 3 year contract for like 5 years I have been through 4 phones … I just cant handle it , they dont give a flying fuck about me regardless of the fact that I pay my bill on time every time.

So right now I am waiting for my phone to come back from repair and I have the pos lender basic phone.. I have no idea who is txting me becuse my address book is gone and I am lost and pissed off.

hmm like 3 minutes after I posted this I got a phone call from telus they are giving me a $200 credit.. but once again I have to restart my 3 year contract lol.. …fine, they already have me by the imaginary balls I might as well admit defeat and bow to their will.. im telus’s bitch.

Hey,
Eggfrmr!
I know rogers has a 30 day consumer remorse policy. Maybe Bell has something similar… Also I have read that Ontario Law dictates that you are able to get out of any contract within 10 days. I would do a little research, but there is a way out. I recently signed up with Rogers cable tv, the sales person reassured me that there was no contract for this and that I could cancel at any time.. 2 weeks later I called to cancel because it was too many channels and I never watched it. The customer service agent said I would have to pay a early cancellation fee because I had signed up for a year… I reminded her of rogers 30 days buyers remorse policy and she froze and then proceeded to cancelling it without any fees… I felt quite warm and fuzzy inside! Dammm it felt good.

I am with Koodo after being with Telus for years. Their customer service sucks! So I decided to go with Koodo only to find out at the end of the fine print that they are a Telus company! So same network and same network problems! At least I didn’t have to sign a contract though….

Telus sucks people! Big time! I’ve had my phone one month and my bill is $300! 911, equipment change fees, etc etc and etc. I mean for $300 i could have stayed with virgin prepayed, had unlimited local nights and weekends, and internet for only $7/month. I hope some bastard at telus mgmt reads this..

My family and I have a family contract with Bell. I alone want to get out of the contract while my family continues with it, is that possible? And how much will it cost and can I lower the price somehow?

I have Rogers, live like 30 mintues away from the Niagara Falls and I have no problems with them. They put something 9on my account to show I live in the place I do and not to get roaming or overcharged or charged for being close to the falls. I got a great plan I pay for 35 a month and has my10 unlimited talk txt photo text. then I got 100 day 1000 night and 500 incoming. So basically I never ever go over it

Just stop paying your plan and go to another company. Its as simple as that. The only thing it stops you from doing is getting another phone from that same company in the future, and if you were crazy enough to go back to that company all you have to do is pay off the old bill and put a security deposit.

No other cell company is going to refuse you service because you walked away from a contract with someone else, and you wont go to jail for walking away from a contract with a company that sold you an over priced item and didnt stand behind the product or service. All they do is pass it to a credit agency who calls and harasses you. So don’t take the calls and when you do by mistake..hang up on them. Its not more difficult then that.
I did this with telus. and although they sent me letters from the collection agency for months…it never affected my credit report (I get a credit report monthly) and even if they do send the info to your credit report. One bad credit mark from a cell phone company does little damage to your credit report if you already have a solid record of paying your mortgage, visa and loans. (I cant comment on someone who is 20 and just starting out)

Call your provider, Ask to get out of your contract if they wont let you then put your services down to bare minimum and walk away (make sure you cut off all extras that dont need to be there) walk away and go get the phone and company you want.

If enough people just walked away when we mistreated in these contracts…they would probably end up treating people a little better and perhaps have better phones or better replacement policies.

Ask around, everyone knows someone who walked away from a contract. No ones gonna hunt you down. You will get annoying calls for a while. If your worried about that ..call in and change your contact phone number before you walk away. They might be able to look further back to get your good contact number but it will make it a little more difficult for them.

Point is this.. if your walking away because they came out with a cooler phone then the one you have..shame on you lol..if your walking away because your phone doesn’t work well, is lost or stolen or some other valid issue..and they wont help you resolve the issue then shame on them.

I signed up for a bell contract for me and my husband six months ago.
Immidiately the next day I took my phone back the next day because the tracking ball wasn’t working correctly. After arguing about it they gave me a replacement phone. After about a month, my phone started erasing my messages, stopped letting me send or recieve messages and freezing. Again I took it back and they gave me a replacement phone. Well a couple of months later, my phone started shutting off while in the middle of trying to send texts, and freezing. I would have to do a hard reset on it to get it working again. After a couple of weeks, my phone died…Literally.
They told me that because it is a replacement phone, that they would not give me a new phone, and charged me $50 bucks for a rental phone, and another $35 bucks for them to send my phone in for repairs. When I got the phone back, I asked them if the problems aren’t fixed, is there a way I can just immidiately bring the phone back? They told me yes, but I would have to pay all those fees again! Well I got out to the car and realized they had taken out my memory card. I got the run around that they would find it, and would call back in a couple of days. I tried calling them back a few times after not hearing back. They kept saying it would take a few more days. They eventually stopped answering my calls. I never saw my memory card again. It had a lot of important pictures on it too. They should have said something when I was sending it in so I would have been able to take it out beforehand…
So now I’m up to six months into my contract, and my phone has recently began freezing again and erasing messages. I decided to grumble but live with it..
After all the trouble with my phone, the icing on the cake, is that I lost my phone in the snow at work..I called them up to find out what can be done, and they told me that I have to buy a new one or just keep paying my bill for nothing for the next two and a half years. Since I have had so many problems with my phone, I would at least like to switch to an Iphone since its like $500 bucks to replace mine…But Nooooo….I can’t buy an Iphone, because you need a CONTRACT to buy it!!!!!

My phone had stopped working twice within the warranty period. So when i got my phone back the 2nd time I talked to the Rogers store owner.

I asked him if he would sign a document saying that if the phone had to be replaced a third time in the warranty period that he would cancel my contract without penalties. The reasoning was that I had paid for the euipment and a service. Due to the phone needing to be fixed, They were not providing me with the service that I was paying for.

So guess what, my third phone stopped working, I went to the store, He remembered me and cancelled my contract without any fees, Gave him the broken phone and walked out.

SKYPE – between new wifi technology and the existing platform that skype brings to the table, we will all soon be using skype or something similar to call one another for pennies. The phone companies know that the gauge is coming to an end so they are raping and pillaging as much as they can. Within the next 5 years, the telephone industry will run into a similar problem that movies and music have. Everyone will be able to phone people for free. The only question is how long does it take to change the sheep? We are sold bundles and packages of nothing? For someone to say it cost me $12 dollars to send 327 text messages on my phone is ridiculous. I can send messages to people for free all the time on my computer. Also WTF is a long distance phone call? We use satellites. In space. Really far away from earth. Spinning around the globe at an incredible pace.

I’ve got a question for this, I’ve been with telus now for 6 years
Been okay for the first 4 years and my previous phone was full of known issues. Phone after phone, call after call, replacement after replacment I held on with them. Finally august 2009 comes around final 6 months of my contract is up! I get a Huge $900 bill saying Internet roaming and international calling from my home town where i have lived for 15 years she asked if I was willing to take a year contract I would be given a new phone for $30 regular $229 no contract price. Shame on me for saying okay, when I payed my $30 I was let on my way. Last night at work I notice a big gap in the crack of the phone, remove the battery cover to notice it is missing a few screws and the glue had came undone… The phone was held by glue. I went into telus today to find my phone is Not under the 1 year promiised warrienty and that when they gave me the phone me not signing anything up mebto anouther 3 year contract. I find this out 6 months befor my contract was suposto be due… I say WTF to the service rep get put throught to customer loyilty and this asain lady whom I could not understand yelled at me saying she was going to see my ass in court and collections would be after me in a week if I didn’t pay.
I want outbid this UNCLEAN contract not to mention I payed for the phone on my next bill because mo credit was issued and they wouldn’t discuss it with me. What wshould I do?????

Sorry my spelling was off on alot of things i was on my ipod and they offered me a $200 dollar credit for the new phone on a 1 year term which turned into a 3 year term. The $900 bill i had to pay and be credited for over and over because charges kept arising nothing but hassel.

I have a bell phone and the end of June the earpiece broke in it and I wasn’t able to hear any sound. Well I took it in to get it fixed and they said the phone was no longer under warranty and that I hadn’t purchased any warranty options. Well way back when I bought my phone they didn’t have that option so how could I have purchased it.

So fast forward to DECEMBER! I call the local store asking why my phone hasn’t been back yet. Cause it has been 6 months. They tell me that they had received it back in November. WOW thank you so much for letting me know that my phone was back!! They said they had called and left messages however with my cell phone bell keeps on changing the password on my voicemail all the time so I never use it. Plus they had my house number and never once called or left a message at home!

I still haven’t picked up my phone yet because they want a $150 to replace a little ear piece and I just don’t have the money right now to put on it. They gave me a replacement phone which I have using for now.

I hope nothing got deleted off my phone when they repaired. Otherwise I’ll be upset. There was pictures of my baby boy on there

Anyways that is my bell rant :@ Contract is up in December, should be able to hold on that long without going too insane with there service. My boyfriend however has another couple of years to go with his. Once I am outta mine gonna start using pay as you go.

okay so i’m stuck with a plan i wana get rid wwith can you help me by any chance pleaseeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee lol i’m not good at this stuff and seems like you’re experienced and can get the work done!

Look people with all your complaints and all; wish we had no cellular phones this world be a better place to live. Mostly every electronic in this world gives people headaches and they never stop to nag , nag and nag. In the 70’s was the best yr; life was much easier then it is now.

pay phones? I rarely see anyone using a pay phone nowadays, 50 cents to make a call, when most people have a cell phone. I agree they can be expensive, but convenient as well, and very helpful if your car breaks down, or you have any kind of emergency.

I’ve been with Rogers for 6 years – started with a pre-paid phone, but was going through pre-paid cards like nobody’s business, so I got a contract phone. Never had any problems; even dropped my phone in the water once and for a $10 replacement fee, they replaced it for the same phone that I had ruined. A year ago, they sent me an upgrade notice and let me upgrade to the BB Curve for free–because I was already upgrading, I updated my price plan to a student plan: $25 My5 plan, $15 for 2MB service, $15 value pack with all my essentials – On top of that I get early evening calling and unlimited incoming/evenings/weekends. They also give me $15 off my plan, $15 off my service pack (so it’s free) and $5 off my value pack, until the end of 2011. Even with my 4-5 long distance calls per month, I’m still only paying about $50 per month.

Rogers hasn’t done me any wrong, and although customer service can be a pain, I’ve found that leaving the conversation and calling back a day or two later can be helpful. Of course, there will be a note in your file that you called the other day but I just explain the the rep I got frustrated and had to leave the conversation and “sleep on it”. Usually, if you’re calm they’re more willing to talk to you. If not, talk to their supervisor.

Now that the cell market is more open (like Koodo, WIND coming into the market) it will very likely get a lot more competitive!

I was with sasktel for 5 years, not a single problem the odd late payment but I was never harassed or bothered they just added a few dollar late fee, my bills were about $90 a month because I called my bestfriend in the states a lot, so when my boyfriend who worked for fido told me I could get an iPhone with unlimited long distance and data I jumped on it… Yeah that was all bull, because I called and text my friend about two hours a week and about 200 texts back and forth a week my first bill was $350. I freaked out my boyfriend and I had broken up so I didn’t know what the he’ll was up, called customer service and I only had unlimited Canada, um what I told the guy when I signed up I wanted it for the states, but there was nothing I could do so I paided it, the next month I was out of town so I left my roommate a cheque to mail them to pay, she sent it three weeks before the bill was due, but my phone was cut off, because I apparently missed a payment. I was stuck in a fifferent province, with No cellphone, so I called customer service and asked what was up, they said my payment was Kate, I said it cme out if my account a week ago, they said they were sorry and would turn my phone back on, it took two days. Now, I owe them $78 and they’re calling me eight times a day.

Should I just bite my lip, pay the $500 to cut this thing off and go back to my sasktel phone with a ling distance plan added? I figured everything out, if I do that at my $175 bill a month and $55 sasktel bill I’d have I’d save $4000 over three years and I’d have service( oh forgot to mention, I’m lucky of I ever get a single bar anywhere)

or does anyone know about virgin? I saw something about unlited talk and text for $7 a month?

I think what sucks is the fact that, if you can’t afford the cell bill anymore. You still get charged for it even if they cut it off. And Bell won’t allow me to change my plan to a lower one, because my account is not up to date on payments.

It seems all companys are a rip off just some are worse then others
5 years ago i had 2 phones with telus i moved into a different servicable area and the phones didnt work for 20 k.
they said i shouldnt of moved and now the bill is up to $5000.00 and collections phone almost daily and as early as 7 am.i told them lets go to court and they said no we will just keep harassing u .i will have to take them to court,they prob wont show up .the file just keeps being sold to different collection companys.they dont even have the guts to collect there own money

They are upping the price for roaming rate charges. I too am looking to get out of my contract for a Blackberry Bold 9700 because they don’t re-rate my charges even though I want to spend MORE every month! If anyone has a really good how to get out of a bell contract, post it and it will help everyone! If bell has a script about how to deal with customers, why not have a script for customers to deal with CSRs!

After switching over to Bell from Rogers, I can now confirm that BOTH companies are terrible.

My Samsung Instinct has been acting up for a long time, and now that the pre installed ‘apps’ arent working, I called to get some kind of credit
towards a new functioning phone. No deal..I even got hung up on twice! Too bad for those employees that I wrote their names and ID’s down

I wrote an email to the Executive part of bell (Email address: [email protected]) and am waiting to hear back. I agree with the post though that says just cancel all of the services and dont worry about the contract part as it will just be a few phone calls and credit score isnt affected. I just dont want to go that far just yet…I’ll wait and see what email reply I get…though I doubt it’ll fix the cell phone issue…

Good luck any Bell users, I love their TV packages but their Mobile Department is the worst

I may be able to save you some money but not completely
get out of your contract….last year I lost my job and had bell put my phone to “sleep” I believe the charge was 3.95/ month but it counts against your contract so if you have 24 months left times 4$ you are looking at less than 100$ to let it go.

My husband and I are with Telus unfortunatley. We have had nothing but absolute trouble with that stupid company. And not only with our cell phones.
I haven’t succesfully cancelled a contract, but I’ve gotten but some pretty sweet deals.
We always pay our bill on time and in full, I make sure to stress that. I always threaten to pay my contract out right and leave the company, because they deffinetly don’t want you to leave. Say some of their competetors names in the conversation too, like “I feel like Rodgers might have a better network in this area, so maybe it would be best for me to try them.”
So if all is going well, your original rep should transfer you to some sort of highter up rep or manager/supervisor that actually has some power, that’s the goal. These people will do anything (within reason) to make loyal customers happy.
Do NOT call angry! I’m sure some of you have worked or do work in customer service and get those cranky customers, are you willing to help them? NO, because they’re being rude! So call when you’re feeling calm and act understanding, speak innocently, ya know?
Don’t get down if it doesn’t work the first time, these things take time and everything is logged, they see that you’ve called 24 times about the same problem, you might just get that one rep that willing to so something about it. You have time! You’re in it for 3 years or more!
Anyway, using this technique has gotten me 3 months free service (telus), countless fees waved (telus), a free upgrade to HD reciever, then to a PVR (shaw) and muuuch more.

Soooooooo I’m stuck with CR$PPY Bell too. I’ve gone through a lot over the last year with them but they just won’t let me cancel without paying the “fee”. Anyways, I looked at all the changes being made in the coming year. Has anyone actually succeeded with Bell? If so please provide some tips. My phone is the Samsung Omnia and it doesn’t function at ALL! Bell’s service is terrible. I don’t get text messages and can’t send text messages, my phone freezes, internet doesn’t work…the list goes on and on.

i have a rogers phone and ive signed up for a three year contract with the first year almost coming to an end.. im sick and tired of the high phone bill i constantly get.. i always change my plan around but it doesnt seem to work. i have two lines under my name and i did a swap phone for one of my phones but rogers says they did not recive my phone (nokia e71) and charged me $499 for that. GREAT! I called in several times and they put ‘cases’ on them and was unable to track the phone. Unfortunately i lost the ups slip that said that i returned the phone. i know.. im screwed!!

what can i do to either get that phone off my bill or to cancel my contract with out a fee?

I’ve spent over an hour on the phone with Bell and spoke to 4 different reps. Was hoping to get out of this plan due to sh!tty phone and start a new plan with an Iphone. No can do. After an hour all I managed to get was a $35 credit and the option to purchase another Bell phone at full price and move my plan over to that phone…………

depressed lady, its awfully easy to get your tracking # from UPS. Have you even tried calling them to get it? All you need to state is where it was shipped from, on what date and to whom. If you did it at a UPS store, even easier to track. Go down to the store and ask for some assistance. They can go through their UPS Ship software and do a search of all the shipments they have done to the location you sent to. I’m with rogers on this one, no tracking, no refund!

Today morning I tried to get ride of Rogers contract as described above. They increased 911 Fee in my last bill. BUT… My attempt failed, CSR said that it is allowed by my contract terms.
Is anybody have it successfully done? Is there any real way to stop it?!

“Unless otherwise specified in the Service Agreement, we may change, at any time, any charges, features, content, programming, structure or any other aspects of the Services, as well as any term or provision of the Service Agreement, upon notice to you.

If you do not accept a change to the Services, your sole remedy is to terminate the Service Agreement and the Services provided under the Service Agreement, within 30 days of your receipt of our notice of change to the Services (unless we specify a different notice period), by providing us with advance notice of termination pursuant to Section 31.

If you do not accept a change to these Terms, your sole remedy is to retain the existing Terms unchanged for the duration of the Commitment Period (as defined below), upon notice to us within 30 days of your receipt of our notice of change in the Terms. ”

So the CRS was pulling your chain, next time ask for his name, employee number and quote their own legal discalamer.

Telus issues, have there been any changes to service within telus for the past 29 days? I need out of my contract because they are EFFIN ridiculous, please email me at [email protected] and let me know.
Thanks.

These fees; system activation fees, 911, and other fees are just a another way to milk the large consumer cow.
System activation fee was CRTC’s mandate for a year or 2 in the late 90’s . But consumer did pay this and we’re still paying on w/ some carriers like Bell, Telus and Rogers. I hope government steps up to the plate and do something to this serious problem.

Till we see a genuine cell phone carrier who cares about consumer and charges based on true service value, we are stuck with the big bullies like BELL, ROGERS, TELUS and other carriers.

thanks, i should print this for my sis.she is absolultly nuts, i swear. She got a cell phone on a 2 year contract at the begining of the month and she does not have a job,i understand it is hard to get a job in this town .She had worked at zellers for a little while and then got fired,hasn’t worked since. It’s like how do you plan on paying for it?!

Same as Scott, In with a Family plan my parents take most of and our phones are all starting to crap out, 3 phones at 20/month/phone with 18 months is just ridiculous. Is there anything Telus has changed in the past 29 days that we could get out on? send to [email protected] please and thank you.

Hey so I called into Rogers after seeing the increase in the 911 emergency access fee.I read their service agreement contract to them saying how they upped the 911 fee and how i wanted to terminate my contract. What the person told me was that I can terminate BUT i still had to pay the early termination fee. The best they could offer was to switch my phone plan, I said no and didnt even listen to what the other plan was. I then contacted the commissioner for complaints for telecommunications services (https://www.ccts-cprst.ca). The person told me that the 911 emergency fee wouldn’t work and I did indeed still have to pay the fee. So I am still stuck.

Of course you’re stuck, we are all stuck! The only way out is if Telus/Rogers/Bell/Fido ect. go out of business. YOU got into this contract! YOU decided you could afford it, and YOU decided that you liked the terms before you agreed (I HOPE). Suck it up, and in 3 years you can get yourself into another terrible contract that you will want out of 2 weeks into it. All free phone contracts are horrible, pay-as-you-go is horrible. Cell phone companies are horrible, but yet we still get in line for the newest, coolest cell.

hi if anyone knows if anything from telus has changed that i could cancel my contract for free i would really appreciate it. Send info to [email protected].(made a mistake when making account so will only get mail unless .ca is used). For you who want to know why I am moving to my dads and there is no cell service but when i called in about it they wouldn’t do nothing and my mom or dad won’t help out.

I signed a 3 year ROGERS contract back in 2006. I was half way thru my contract when I got a job in Kuujjuaq Quebec. My buddy who was moving there too, currently worked at Rogers. He and I both got out of our contracts with one simple call.

I simply stated that I was moving to Kuujjuaq where there is NO cell service. No carriers or coverage at all. The lady at ROGERS wanted the postal code and stuff like that, my new address etc. I gave it all to her and that was all. By the end of the next pay period I was cut free. Just like that.

I’ve heard of people doing this, but needing to provide a paystub or some similar proof of the actual move. But I got lucky. So try it. And if they want proof…..crinkle a candy wrapper in the phone, pretend to lose the call. And try again with a different rep.

When I returned to civilization, I signed up with Koodo Mobile. Love it!! No issues with them at all. Everything is simple, NO CONTRACT!!!!! Great rates! I can’t boast enough about them. Only issue is that they have a tiny phone selection. Now that I’m ready to move up to a SMARTPHONE, I have no choice but to leave KOODO.

So I’m signing on with ROGERS again. But I’m going in with my defenses up. The key is to be careful. Watch your usage, match your plan, and be aware that the $45 sticker price on your plan is gonna look more like $60 a month after fees and taxes and that random long distance call.

But seriously…..KOODO rocks. If all you want is a straight shooting, simple cellphone that makes calls….and not much more. Go with Koodo. You’lll be glad you did. Best of luck to all.

I called the crooks today(rogers) 3 times,the first one he said i had no right to terminate the contarct without paying early cancelation fee,the second time he left on hold for 30 min until i hanged up,the third one he listened to me then he transfered me the customer care then he said ok but he needs a permission from a higher manager but the higher manager refused to terminate the contract without the early termination fee but he offered me 1000 long distance minutes for 5 dollars at beginning but i told him break the contract or i file a complaint so he tried to convince me but when he saw me so determine to terminate the contract he told me go to file a complain i can’t help u with that,so now i will file a complain and wait ,thanks bob for the answer.and thank u all for the great info here.and i will update u what happens next.

really? the law is the law, we’re given 30 days to accept or decline their changes without our consent, this is not what we originally signed up for in the contract and now they’re changing rates, regardless if it affects us or not, it is still a change within the contract and by law you have the right to decline the new terms.

“Effective June, 2010:
The late payment fee will be charged at a rate of 3% (42.58% per year) from a rate of 2% (26.82% per year).”

Call in customer service, say you’re changing my TOS (Terms of Service) and that voids my contract (You agreed to one thing, they changed it), I’d like out without early termination fees (As you complained within 30 days).

Remember, sometime you need to smooth talk and stuff, but you read the article, hahaha!

I was looking for a way out as well and I saw that they will change the late fee rates. But on my contract it says, ” Fees subject to change except as set out in the Terms of Service.” So can anyone tell me if using the late fee rate hike as a means to get out of there contract will work?

Dude…. Even with that recent change there is no way out… I pointed the person to section 23 where it says i can get out and she said that i still had to pay SAPA (the up to 400$ ) bullshit fee! Someone help….

Does ”
your sole remedy in the event of such a change shall be termination of the Services including the payment of any SAPA or DSAPA that may apply (unless otherwise prohibited by law), upon providing 30 days advance written notice. ”

Hi
I’m with Rogers and actually just called regarding the change in long distance rates. I didn’t want to cancel my contract, I just wanted a credit or a deal or something. Anyway I told the woman that I knew I was legally able to but it would be a shame to, so I wanted it back down to .30$ and she said she couldn’t. I mentioned a previous post of someone who got it down to .30$ plus got 100 free locals per month, and she finally said she could give me a 100 free long distance minutes per month for the rest of my contract (16 months).

Im signed to telus at the moment. Everytime i break my phone and need a new one they offer a renewal of contract to get me a super expensive phone for cheap. It really sucks because everytime i break my phone i lose all my numbers seeing as telus has no sim cards. I just recently broke my phone and am not looking foward to going into the telus store to see how much money im gonna have to drop on my next phone seeing as i got this phone from the so called “renewal”. Fuck cell phones i want to be able to send a mind message. Now i just want to get a cccheap phone. So that next time im not paying another 400$ for a phone with television on it.

Does anyone know when this rogers long distance change took place? I’m going to attempt cancellation today, July 4th, 2010. Hopefully I can still leave because I am thoroughly dissatisfied with rogers’ service…

it started on the 4th of july,i doubt u can do something about it,i called them on the beginning of june and they refused to cancel it with the early termination fees and offered me 1000 long distance minutes for 5 bucks and i refused it,so i made a complain and i’m waiting.

I’m looking to get out of my Roger’s contract after only a few months of service. If anyone is capable of breaking their contract because of the change in long distance charges please post and let me know! I’m desperate and really need a way out of Roger’s tom foolery of a business!

sorry I wasn’t very clear. I know I am limited to 30 days after they introduce these changes to leave my contract. Does the 30 day period begin when they announce the changes? Or, when they actually implement the changes? Thanks, Karl.

you know how if a service provided.. (bell) changes there agreement you can fuck them over by leaving
the company without paying the contract cancelation fee… i just found out that they changed shit with my upgrade…
i was aspost to be able to use my 50 dollars a year.. to upgrade a phone but they changed it to 100 a every 2 years
could i cancel my contract cuz of that? i never been notified about this… i found out from walking into a bell store
trying to get an upgrade.. please someone let me know… this can change everything for alot of people that didnt know and want to leave bell
email me at [email protected] thanks

Anyone know if a change from 25 cents added onto the 911 Emergency Access Fee on a Rogers contract will get me out ?! I’m trying to find something to get out of my Rogers contract of 3 years, but all I’ve found so far is the change from 50 cents (as it said on my first contract,[my very very first, it was attached to the invoice for buying the whole thing]) to the 75 cents that I’ve just found on my most recent Rogers bill. Do you guys think the 25 cent difference is enough to get me out ??

My 3 year cell contract with Rogers ended in November 2009. I kept using the cell phone and paying the bills, but Rogers never asked me to renew or sign a new contract. Am I on the hook with Rogers because I continued paying on that account, or can I walk away?

If you finished the 3 year contract, then you are now on a month-per-month basis, and if you want to keep your current rate, you can, you can stao at any time given 30 days notice and sign up for a new contract and rates.

If you complain enough and go to the right people you can get pretty much anything. I cracked the screen on my HTC touch and complained until they send me a new one. Took awhile and 2 different stores but got a new phone for free!

19. Changes to this Agreement and the Service. You agree that all Sections of this Agreement or parts thereof, and any fees, charges or other obligations and any features, options, or other aspects of the Services, may be modified or terminated by Bell except to the extent expressly prohibited by any law to which Bell is subject. We will notify you by providing you a clear and legible written notice at least 30 days in advance of any change that affects you. If applicable and if required by any law to which Bell is subject, the notice will set out the new provision or the changed provision, and the provision as it is read formerly, along with the date of the coming into force of the change and your rights set out below. Nothing in this Agreement shall be construed as obligating you to accept receipt of the Services after any change is made to this Agreement, the Services or otherwise; however, your sole remedy in the event of such a change shall be, if the change would increase your obligations or reduce ours, to refuse the change and cancel the agreement which has been changed upon the payment of any amounts payable as specified in the main part of your Service Agreement and any other applicable fees or charges, except where such fees or charges are prohibited by any law to which Bell is subject, in which case such cancellation shall be without cost, penalty or cancellation indemnity. You must notify us of such cancellation within 30 days of the effective date of change. Should you continue to receive the Services after such period, you expressly agree that no additional written agreement or express acknowledgement shall be required to accept such change and, unless otherwise prohibited by any law to which Bell is subject, you specifically waive any and all statutory requirements for notice and express acceptance of such changes except for those provided in this paragraph. You agree that you cannot change this Agreement and that, except as expressly prohibited by law to which Bell is subject, no oral or written statement or representation of any sales agent, representative or employee of Bell made to you can change this Agreement.

20. Ending your Agreement and Services. You may terminate your monthly rate plan and/or data feature or plan as set out in the Service Agreement presented to you (of which these Terms of Services are part),subject to payment of any amounts set out therein, if you do so before the end of your Service Commitment Period.

You may cancel any other monthly feature or option you subscribe to. You will be billed the remainder of any applicable monthly charge plus applicable taxes.

If you are a prepaid client, you may cancel your Agreement at any time. Your Services will automatically deactivate if you remain at a zero balance for 120 days or such other period as Bell may notify you. Any balance remaining in your account on termination is non-refundable.

We may end your Agreement and any or all Services and deactivate your Device by providing you 30 days advance written notice (except to the extent expressly prohibited by any law to which Bell is subject), or at any time without notice if you do not pay any amount owing when due, or you otherwise breach any term of this Agreement including failing to provide or top up a security deposit on request, and failing to activate your Device within 45 days of purchase. If we end your Agreement and the Services before the end of your Service Commitment Period as a result of your non-payment or other breach of the Agreement, you must pay (i) an amount, plus applicable taxes, equal to the greater of (a) $100 or (b) $20 per month for each month remaining in your Service Commitment Period, to a maximum of $400, due to termination of your monthly rate plan; and (ii) an amount plus applicable taxes, equal to the Data Credit divided by the total number of months in the Service Commitment Period, multiplied by the number of months remaining in the Service Commitment Period after termination, due to termination of your data plan or feature which you committed to receive during the Service Commitment Period. Both amounts (plus applicable taxes) shall be payable if we terminate both monthly rate and data plans, or a combined monthly rate and data plan, before the end of your Service Commitment Period.

Upon deactivation of the Device, and/or termination of the Services and this Agreement, you must pay in full all charges that are due including any amounts set out in the main part of your Service Agreement if you choose to terminate before the end of your Service Commitment Period, late payment fees and any outstanding payments, fees and charges owing under this Agreement, plus applicable taxes. This obligation survives termination of this Agreement. Any SIM card will be deactivated and may not be reactivated. Bell will provide a refund of the amount of any credits greater than $5 which remain outstanding (after netting out any amounts payable by you) upon the termination of this Agreement.

You must contact your financial institution to cancel any direct debit and credit card authorizations relating to your account.

I’ve more than a few of you say you’re jumping to Rogers. Let me warn you, I have been with Rogers for about 7 years, I left Telus because I thought they were such crooks. They have nothing on Rogers. My bill routinely goes up and up…I started at a $25/mo contract but I rarely pay less than $100. Usually it’s been around $120 lately but I’m sure it will go up. When I phone to complain they give me the usual crap about my usage-which has gone down by the way, and that I am on the wrong plan. After trying different plans and calling in to complain every few months I know I’ll never get a fair deal. In fact they have even phoned me on many occasions to harass me to pay bills that were not yet due. They were calling me monthly for close to a year until I threatened to cancel the phone the next time they call about anything. I am going to cancel late fee or not. What are they going to do anyway?? Phone me? I WILL NOT PAY!! In fact if everyone refused to pay any fee or bill over $50, we may see changes after all.

First off, all the companies out there are crooks.. depending on what your looking for you can find the right crook for you.

I’ve been a loyal customer with Rogers for over a decade now, and regardless of prices going up over the years I had no issue with it cause the technology also increased over the years and provided better quality TV, faster internet speeds (sometimes lol) and better mobile phones (etc..) I started hating rogers when I realized they started not only over charging, and I am not talking about the regular increases they are aloud to do but charging you for services you aren’t receiving regardless if you ask for them or not. To make a long story short Rogers over charges for so called “better service”.

I had my issue’s with Telus back in the day when It first bought out clearnet, not sure if anyone remembers them or not.. I loved clearnet but then it turned into Telus. Well I had a cellphone with them and my warranty was about to expire in a month so I figured since my phone wasn’t working too great I would take it in to have them take a look at it and see if they can fix it or not. I can’t remember the exact issue, was something small which didn’t worry me much but still I wanted to cover my ass-ets before the warranty expired. They gave me a replacement phone till mine got fixed, I waited a week.. 2 weeks and then I call and ask them whats going on, they kept on giving me “we will call you when its ready”. Well I finally get my phone back few days after the warranty expired but not only did they not fix it but it wasn’t working.. its like instead of repairing the phone they made it ten times worse, when I brought this to there attention they told me they can send it out but since my warranty is now over it would cost me XXX$ (dont remember the exact amount) for them to send it out and to have it looked at, not fixed!

I am currently with Bell and besides the first bills getting misplaced I haven’t had an issue with them yet.. everyone’s so polite when I explain myself to them, if they can’t help me they will try and find someone who might be able to help.. this was extremely shocking to me considering all the rude customer service I have gotten from rogers the past year.. it almost felt like bell hired all the good rogers reps they had in the past and rogers hired all the rude bell reps that I heard so much about. Even after not having payed my services for 3 months because I totally forgot about the bill since I never got it (they had an error in my address).. I never got one threatening call about payment, nor did they disconnect any service. After the third month of non payment I had gotten a polite phone call reminding me about my Bell Bills that are over due and when I explained that I never gotten my bill yet they offered to credit my account any late fee’s and they re-printed my bills I didn’t get and had them sent out with an extended due day. I had a similar incident with Rogers and I made a late payment, less then a week late, not only did I get a letter (not sure how they knew it was going to be late) but a very rude phone call about it as well.

Don’t sign up with Virgin. There is no customer retention program like there is with Rogers, so when I got a bill for almost $600 for “data usage” that I didn’t use, there was nobody I could talk to who could actually do anything. It took 2 months just to talk to the billing department, who told me I had to go to tech support, who (wrongfully) said I was tethering, and later was told it was impossible for them to know if I was tethering or mobile browsing.
Horrible company. It is also $400 to cancel, but if you’re within your first year of the contract, $600 ($200 is added because you are removing the data plan when you cancel). Total BS.
Go with Rogers.

i Have a 2 year solo mobile contract. The cell phone I have is a lg rumor. I really hate the service. I’ve had the phone for 11 months. My bill keeps going up. I called solo mobile and they said it would cost $800 to cancel my contract. What should I do?

I have a Samsung Instinct with Bell on the 3 year contract. I’ve finished a year and still have two years left. I’M FED UP WITH EVERYTHING! I’ve had so many problems with this phone and bell’s services. The phone lags when I text (so I can only press a letter ever 3 seconds), calls get dropped for no reason, terrible reception, get charged $26 for internet access when I’m on UNLIMITED MOBILE BROWSER (I had to call and had them waive this), and now, my touch screen in broken for no apparent reason. I press a spot and the screen will think I pressed it 5mm away, and the bottom left corner of my screen just completely stopped responding so I get no punctuations when I text. I’m paying more than $50 dollars a month for this phone by the way. I’ve called bell today and they told me that there’s nothing they can do and I would have to pay $400 to cancel my contract! Someone help me!

I also have a two year contract with SOLO and I took the contract specifically because I prefer to text rather than call. I was satisfied with the service initially until I started receiving text messages hours late (up to 6 hours late) or getting messages that are incomplete or not receiving incoming messages and have my sent messages not being received by my family and friends. I called Solo about this they suggested I do a “soft boot” once every week or take the batteries off and leave it off for a minute and put it back in. Unfortunately this didn’t work for long. The next time I called them, they said that i needed to present them with proof that I had text messaging problems within a 48 hour period and only then could they “accelerate” my case. So I gave them proof (more than the two examples they asked for), they initially blamed other cell phone providers for the problem (mostly rogers, actually just rogers but i had trouble sending and receiving from Telus as well) they told me that they would call me to let me know what the problem was and how they have resolved it. Its been about a 3 weeks since that phone call and still no update. I doubt that they will ever get back to me. Meanwhile my text messaging problems continues and has gotten even worse, instead of the usual one or two messages being missed every day or two, it is now several text messages a day not being received by me (from friends and family) or my messages not being received (by my friends and family). Their customer service reps are nice enough but seems to lack the knowledge (I cannot stress that enough) or the power to help. The hours for their customer service center just plain sucks. I am constantly on hold every few minutes (not even kidding) because they can’t answer the simplest questions without having to transfer me to a different department. I’m gonna keep trying to get an update on my problem but I’m afraid that I will keep getting the same response. SOLO SUCKS! I want out of the contract but I don’t want to pay the cancellation fee. I’m wondering if any SOLO mobile customers have ever had this kind of problem…let me know!

would getting a friend/family member to call and say that I died get me out of my rogers contract?

or if i lied and said i didnt sign the contract? like say someone i know did it?

ive been with rogers for a year and all they do is harass me, call me all day every day, over charge me and give me the run around! dealing with them has been a nightmare!

like i never and i mean NEVER go over my alloted time my texts are free and i got 6 gigs a month that i never go over and i never use long distance, yet i always find 20 and 30 $ charges here and there making my bills well over 100$ a month when im never over. sad part about it is i could be paying 40$ a month and be getting more than i am now on pay as you go! this is BS!

are these contracts unilateral or bilateral contracts. if they are unilateral meaning that there is only one signature this means that by law the only one who can controle the contract is the one who signs it and that person can change the contract at any time. if the contract is bilateral then the both parties who signed it (would be you and the PERSON you are in contract with) have to agree to change it. I cant remember what where I saw this. I think it may have been http://www.worldfreemansociety.org or also check out the bill of exchange act.

I have a 3 year contract with Bell and after 15 months, I’ve had move to an area where there is no cell coverage from Bell, for work purposes. I’m trying to switch to Rogers (it’s the only company that provides service out here) but Bell wants me to pay $380 to terminate the contract even though they confirmed that my place of residence does not have Bell coverage. Crooks. How can someone bind you to a contract if they can’t provide the service?

I renewed my contract a yr and a half ago. Like others I had the stupid HTC shit phone, and had to return it 3 times for repair, and evreytime i called the customer service rep. they couldn’t do anything about it. And I ended up buying a used bb curve from kijiji, because i didn’t want to renew with them. This is ridiculous….also the features and bundles I previously had expired and I didn’t get any notifications.I had to call and they had to give me other bundles and now I’m paying way more. So I had to switch to 5favorites option. Then the freaking customer service rep. made a mistake and I ended up being charged 330 bucks cause he put the wrong number. I was transferred to escalations and the rep. was a total stuck-up bitch. Made me pay for long distance and credited half of the amount. So my bill ended up being 176 instead. Either way their service sucks and I’ve been with them for the longest time and they couldn’t do anything about it.And now my bill is close to a 100 bucks, and I still have a yr and a half left. I heard that if you renew your contract you can then cancel your contract and you would only have to pay like one mth payment or so as opposed to 300 bucks. Is it true?? or if not is there a way to release myself from stupid telus without paying 300 bucks.

Can someone translate this. This is my bell terms of conditions. I live in Canada toronto Ontario. This is the section of changes to the contract. Can anyone tell me what it is saying. Please and thank you.

19. Changes to this Agreement and the Service. You agree that all Sections of this Agreement or parts thereof, and any fees, charges or other obligations and any features, options, or other aspects of the Services, may be modified or terminated by Bell except to the extent expressly prohibited by any law to which Bell is subject. We will notify you by providing you a clear and legible written notice at least 30 days in advance of any change that affects you. If applicable and if required by any law to which Bell is subject, the notice will set out the new provision or the changed provision, and the provision as it is read formerly, along with the date of the coming into force of the change and your rights set out below. Nothing in this Agreement shall be construed as obligating you to accept receipt of the Services after any change is made to this Agreement, the Services or otherwise; however, your sole remedy in the event of such a change shall be, if the change would increase your obligations or reduce ours, to refuse the change and cancel the agreement which has been changed upon the payment of any amounts payable as specified in the main part of your Service Agreement and any other applicable fees or charges, except where such fees or charges are prohibited by any law to which Bell is subject, in which case such cancellation shall be without cost, penalty or cancellation indemnity. You must notify us of such cancellation within 30 days of the effective date of change. Should you continue to receive the Services after such period, you expressly agree that no additional written agreement or express acknowledgement shall be required to accept such change and, unless otherwise prohibited by any law to which Bell is subject, you specifically waive any and all statutory requirements for notice and express acceptance of such changes except for those provided in this paragraph. You agree that you cannot change this Agreement and that, except as expressly prohibited by law to which Bell is subject, no oral or written statement or representation of any sales agent, representative or employee of Bell made to you can change this Agreement.

My contract ends with Bell mobilty today. We called to end our service on that phone and they said that we had to give them 30 days notice and that they were going to bill us an additional month!! WTF??

My husband called fido to cancel cuz he is not happy with it and he didnt pay for 2 montths n they cancelled when he said u cancelled it and i am not happy with u i wanna go for wings other provider in qc and they gave him unlimited talk in usa n canada for 100$ try mentioning other providers n pls keep in mind rogers fido same company and donno abt others

My question is; Why does the CRTC allow this? I was stuck with a Bell contract for three years. I moved twice in those three years, both times to no-service zones, they refused to cancel. I received creditor calls ALL OF THE TIME from the previous owner of my number, they REFUSED to comp my bill or cancel the number. They changed my rate six times in one three-year term, and refused to negotiate or cancel. After I cancelled my cell with them, they continue (to this day) to send me spam to my home offering me “wonderful deals” to win me back, and they constantly call me (although I’m on the do-not-call list) to offer me the same “wonderful deals,” and no matter what I say to them, they continue to harass me.

I have no good feelings toward Bell… and I am not surprised by the fact that there are 201 other responses to this post…

Ok. So what I am reading here is that all cell phone providers suck. There are people on here wanting out of contracts with Bell, Telus, Rogers, Fido, Virgin, SaskTel,…who is left??? Seems like a lose-lose situation. If you can’t afford to buy a good phone outright and have to sign a contract, there doesn’t seem to be any company out there that provides both service and phones good enough to make everyone happy. I personally have had beyond horrendous service from Bell and Rogers, and only mediocre service from SaskTel and Telus. I don’t think customer service exists anymore. It is a lost cause even trying to get out of your contract, because chances are the grass won’t be any greener with the next provider.

I had some late payments, and had made a deal to pay Fido the $500 owing in late November (mainly from ridiculously high charges on my phone from being in western Canada and not being able to change my SIM card, nor did Fido offer any location change discount). I missed the payment due to a family emergency overseas, and I called them today to pay the $500 off, and they told me they had canceled my account (without notifying me) AND charged me an additional $550 in early cancellation fees!!!!
So they cancel my account without my knowledge, then charge me $500 for canceling it!
What a bunch of snakes in this industry. I’m done with cellphones. Best message to send these companies: we don’t need you.

Does anyone have any advise??? I would really appreciate it, because now I’m sitting on a debt to Fido of nearly $1400!!!!

No matter who you go with you are going to end up getting a large bill if you do not ask questions or if you do not monitor your conditions of contract, ignorance is NOT bliss.

I have called Rogers on many occasions and have always been greeted in a friendly and courteous fashion, if the CSR was unable to answer my inquiry they would forward me to someone who did. They even went above and beyond a few time to ensure that I was a happy customer, here is a few examples:

I noticed that since HST came into play my bills went up about 30 dollars a month, so I called and talked to the CSR to tell her how this affects me as a single Mom. I was pleasant on the phone in requesting ‘any help she can offer’ and after about 10 mins on the phone she decided that she could reduce my bill for my cell phone, and my daughters cell phone by 10% each month, per account..till the end of my contract it adds up after awhile!

Many times I called when I noticed charges on my bill I did not understand, like extra charges for phone calls, etc.. they ALWAYS fixed it!

When my daughter first got her phone she accidentally used the internet for a month thinking she had access to it because you can’t block it on the phone, ended up being like 120.00 extra. I called, explained, complained and then it was removed with a promise to add a internet feature unlimited for 10 bucks a month.. no problems ..

Finally I called today because I was encouraged by this and other reviews of Mobilicity that I have read and decided its best to talk to a Customer Relations Expert instead of a CSR. I told them I wanted the same type of savings for the money I pay since I am a Valued Customer (wink wink) and after only 15 minutes on the phone I am now in an even better place with Rogers. <3

I now have an extra 100 free long distance minutes every month, 10$ off my entire bill till my contract is done… and no additional time on my contract!

Seriously it all adds up to a few things:
—————————————–
1. ALWAYS be respectful
2. discrepancies on bill needs to be discussed and/or gently argued within 30 days
3.ask lots of questions
4. if you don’t like your contract you shouldn’t have signed up in the first place without researching the pros n cons, plain n simple.
5. if you want to make changes to your account, dont be a jerk, they are people too, speak to them with respect and genuine curiosity and you will be surprised how much they can ‘alter’ your contract..

You have got to be kidding me, you morons are saying “rogers is the best” – are braindead. There are new companies out there that have truly really unlimited plans for cheaper than rogers’s shitty regular plans. Try wind mobile or mobilicity.

And UBB, the thing where they want to charge you per gigabyte downloaded, created by rogers and bell. I attribute you liking rogers to absolute ignorance, or you are paid shills for them.

I’ve just been relieved of my early contract termination fee of $320 (a remaining term of 16 months) with Telus. Here are the facts:

1) I had an LG Dare phone 3 year contract with Telus.

2) Approximately 7 months ago I began receiving duplicate text messages (initially thought of as an anomaly).

3) Duplicate (2) texts began increasing in frequency from various carriers and I began calling Telus technical support for assistance. Numerous assistance calls were made over the following 5 months.

4) In December, duplicate texts began increasing in numbers and frequency in excess of 10 duplicates being delivered over a period of hours. Another call to technical assistance resulted in a software upgrade (phone firmware was already up to date, but tried anyway), a phone reset, and the messages being “pushed” though. I was informed that there were network problems resulting in some duplicate text messages.

5) An other text came though from a different carrier resulting in 10 duplicates, again a call to technical support, during which I was informed “no ticket has ever been logged regarding your complaint, I’ll do that now.” I was thankful and displeased.

6) The following evening, a text message was delivered over 30 times over a period of 10 hours. An other call to Telus, during which I was informed that the ticket had been dismissed as a hardware problem, however, the Telus employee agreed that it was still a network problem. A new ticket was logged.

7) I hired (free of charge) an external professional (in the wireless network field) to provide a second opinion, which was that “I’m almost certain it’s not your phone.”

8) An other call to Telus, this time with full intention of canceling my plan, and being relieved of an early cancellation fee. This 95 minute call was a failure, during which I spoke with a) technical assistance b) loyalty c) technical assistance again d) loyalty again. The loyalty employee insisted the phone was causing the problems and offered me (in manitoba) an iPhone and iPhone plan, and agreed to let me keep my Manitoba phone number…then moments later, retracted the offer due to lack of coverage in my area. He also offered me a 3 year contract renewal with a fee. I told him that these offers were insulting and unreasonable, and we parted ways.

9) The following day I received a text message over 100 times, over a period of 30 hours. During the repeated texts (6 hours later), I contacted technical assistance and asked for the messages to be “pushed” through, with a verbal acknowledgment of receipt. This was either done and failed, or it wasn’t done at all…as I said, the message repeated for the following 24 hours. I asked the agent if there were any problems with my phone, and he stated “there are no known text messaging issues with your phone.”

10) The following day, I contacted CCTS (1-888-221-1687) (http://www.ccts-cprst.ca/) and spoke with a pleasant agent and described my problem. I also informed the agent that my profession requires an obligation to obtain a certain quality/amount of rest prior to arriving for work, and also requires an obligation to be contactable at certain times. I explained that I can not meet these two obligations with these circumstances and was considering changing carriers to end the drama. He told me, that the circumstances I described were within the means of CCTS to pursue Telus about and if I changed carries I should note it in my complaint file. The nature of my complaint was “SERVICE DELIVERY.”

11) I received one last text message over 100 times, lasting 60 hours.

12) I walked into an apple store, signed up for a 3 year iPhone contract with a different company. During the sign up process, I had my number ported to my new phone (immediately severing my contract with Telus), and carried on.

13) CCTS initiated the complaint process for me, and Telus contacted me 2 weeks later to offer a) a new phone, b) a waiver on my early termination fee provided I return to Telus, and finally c) a full waiver on my early termination fee with no strings attached. I accepted the waiver with no strings attached, the gal completed the transaction immediately (there was a balance owing on the account for the portion of the month I still had service), accepted credit card payment for the ~$60 balance owing, and confirmed my current balance was $0.

Voila, out of contract. You may have to en dour a very troubling process, and want to pull your hair out at times, however, if you had a record of legitimate problems with the delivery of service, your cell company (although may be contractually bound by the fact that you signed a form saying THEY ARE NOT OBLIGATED TO ACTUALLY PROVIDE YOU SERVICE), by law, they are also not allowed to charge you for a service they did not provide.

Hi:
I got this in my last invoice from Rogers and want to know if it is enough to get out of my 3 years contract, still have 2 more years and I’m really tired of their horrible service and the sky high bills. Please help me.

Vilma, I doubt that is a valid reason to get out of your contract. I don’t think that Rogers has control over what 411 charges for their directory assistance services therefore they can not be held responsible for any changes therein. However, if you read your ENTIRE bill you will notice that Rogers is changing their pay-per-use texting rate from $0.15/message to $0.20/message as of MArch 16, 2011; I assume this is grounds for cancellation of contract without early termination fees. If what everyone on this thread is saying is legitimate, I would think this type of change would invalidate the contract that we all signed. To be affected by this change, however, you can NOT have an unlimited messaging plan. If you do have unlimited messaging, the pay-per-use rate does not affect you and therefore does not invalidate your contract.

Thanks a lot, Elena. You made my day, I didn’t see that, guess I’m trying so desperately to get out of the contract that I’m missing the important things. I’m going to try with this, hope it will work. Thanks again.

Hi:
This is to let you know that the change to the pay-per-use texting rate did not work. They say that the contract says nothing about it, that because is a pay-per-use service, you have the choice to use it or not.
So, they finally screwed me and I have to pay $500 in top of my bill for february and the bill for march (they say is 30 days notice, which it’s not in the contract either). Anyways, good luck to all of you and I wish you can get rid of them.

, if the change would increase your obligations or reduce ours, to refuse the change and cancel the agreement which has been changed upon the payment of any amounts payable as specified in the main part of your Service Agreement and any other applicable fees or charges, except where such fees or charges are prohibited by any law to which Bell is subject, in which case such cancellation shall be without cost, penalty or cancellation indemnity.

Consumer Protection Statute Law Amendment Act, section 42.2.2

2. The agreement gives the consumer at least one of the following alternatives to accepting the supplier’s proposal to amend, renew or extend:

i. terminating the agreement, or

ii. retaining the existing agreement unchanged.

The above is only valid in Ontario, but there is likely something similar in other provinces too since it

Ok, so I’m still hung up on the Bill of Acceptance as was referred to up in the thread, stating the difference between unilateral and bilateral contracts. Does that mean that ANY cell contract can be void if only the cellphone user has signed it and not the company?
Wanting to get out of my Roger’s contract. Tried the 411 rate increase, no luck. Have unlimited txting so no luck on that fee increase….wanting to tell them I’m moving somewhere without service. Anyone know if you’re required to show them proof of “new address”. Am almost ready to suck up the fee and go with Koodo. My hubby has Koodo. No contract, no taking it up the a**, just service. It’s pretty sweet. I’m so jealous.

I’m in a battle with Bell/Virgin. A number of my clients can’t each me on my cell phone, they get “the phone number you have called is no longer in service”. Not ideal situation when I’m using it for business. After fighting with customer service, numerous re-programming etc, they send me a replacement phone (refurbished one). The problem got worse, now I can’t call those same clients. So I decided to research the problem myself. Turns out all the clients use VoIP (internet) phone service. So I go back to Bell/Virgin customer service, they told me that Bell/Virgin does NOT support VoIP and can NOT guarantee connection. That answer was so upsetting that I called again two days later, and received the same answer. They have sent me to the complaints department. I’ll keep you posted.

, if the change would increase your obligations or reduce ours, to refuse the change and cancel the agreement which has been changed upon the payment of any amounts payable as specified in the main part of your Service Agreement and any other applicable fees or charges, except where such fees or charges are prohibited by any law to which Bell is subject, in which case such cancellation shall be without cost, penalty or cancellation indemnity.

Consumer Protection Statute Law Amendment Act, section 42.2.2

2. The agreement gives the consumer at least one of the following alternatives to accepting the supplier’s proposal to amend, renew or extend:

i. terminating the agreement, or

ii. retaining the existing agreement unchanged.

The above is only valid in Ontario, but there is likely something similar in other provinces too since it

You agree that all Sections of this Agreement or parts thereof, and any fees, charges or other obligations and any features, options, or other aspects of the Services, may be modified or terminated by Bell except to the extent expressly prohibited by any law to which Bell is subject. We will notify you by providing you a clear and legible written notice at least 30 days in advance of any change that affects you. If applicable and if required by any law to which Bell is subject, the notice will set out the new provision or the changed provision, and the provision as it is read formerly, along with the date of the coming into force of the change and your rights set out below. Nothing in this Agreement shall be construed as obligating you to accept receipt of the Services after any change is made to this Agreement, the Services or otherwise; however, your sole remedy in the event of such a change shall be, if the change would increase your obligations or reduce ours, to refuse the change and cancel the agreement which has been changed upon the payment of any amounts payable as specified in the main part of your Service Agreement and any other applicable fees or charges, except where such fees or charges are prohibited by any law to which Bell is subject, in which case such cancellation shall be without cost, penalty or cancellation indemnity. You must notify us of such cancellation within 30 days of the effective date of change. Should you continue to receive the Services after such period, you expressly agree that no additional written agreement or express acknowledgement shall be required to accept such change and, unless otherwise prohibited by any law to which Bell is subject, you specifically waive any and all statutory requirements for notice and express acceptance of such changes except for those provided in this paragraph. You agree that you cannot change this Agreement and that, except as expressly prohibited by law to which Bell is subject, no oral or written statement or representation of any sales agent, representative or employee of Bell made to you can change this Agreement.

I want out of my contract, and after three levels of Bell customer service, and reiteration that I want to cancel due to changes to my cell contract, a manager refused to cancel without charging a $400 cancellation fee? What gives? Her explanation that was that there were no changes to my regular plan, only changes to charges outside of plan. Seems fishy to me.

I just contacted bell regarding the new text messaging rate inorder to get out of my contract
and I refereed to the number 19 of terms of service but they said that I cant cancel because it says i dont get charged cancellation fee only if it is prohibited by the law that bell is subjected to.
I had nothing else to say when they said it like that and the only law is if we move to somewhere where there is no service.
Can anyone help me get out of bell contract using this new text messaging rate change?

GRam I had tried the same thing, and got the same answer. The first few people I spoke with weren’t even aware that there was the 30 day rule. They argued with me that this rule didn’t even exist.

I spoke with a supervisor, and after some arguing, I got him to agree that such a rule does exist, but that I don’t qualify. There have been changes to the rates, but this does not affect my core agreement. They said they would email me with actual information as to why this is, but so far nothing. I think he was stalling.

I’ve dealt with numerous customer service issues in addition to Bell’s crap-tastic service. I’ve reviewed everyone’s comments and unfortunately I too, have unlimited text messaging so I can’t use the change of contract terms to get out of it.

I’m also trying to get out of my Bell contact mostly because the phone is a piece of crap (Blackberry Bold 9000); turns off unexpectedly often. I don’t want them to fix it because I’ve dealt with loner phones and it’s bullshit. Then you’ve still got an old phone once it’s returned months later. I’ve been in this contact for about 16 months and they are not offering any incentives. I’ve been with them for nearly 8 years and nothing! I want an iPhone but they are not offering an upgrade credit and I really don’t want to pay to get out of my contract (over $200).

i’m in the same boat as you. i want out of my bell contract but have to pay $260 plus tax to do so. i want the bold 9900 but with Rogers. when i called to ask the cost of cancelling, he told me the price and asked if i wanted to cancel. he didn’t even care and get me to stay with them.

We signed up for a Bell Contract in May 2011. The Samsung Galaxy phone that we received for the contract died on day 14 that we had received it. we went to the store immediately on the 14th day and they told us to contact Bell and Bell would replace it.

BELL… said go back to the store it wasnt their problem…

only way to get back to the store as it was after hours was the next day… the next day (day 15) the store manager said and I quote.. “its been 15 days we are not required to replace your phone” call Bell….

now calling Bell back the said the exact same thing…
back to the store… back to Bell.. this went on for about 2 weeks then we were getting different people and the response now was “its been 30days you cant get out of it”….

then Bell wanted $350 from us and we would send the phone back and they would REPAIR it… not replace it but REPAIR it… are you kidding me??

a) being a working couple and having debts and a mortgage we dont have an extra $350…
b) thats bullshit
c) thats bullshit
d) never got another helpful response from a Bell rep.

my wife called for the most part because I would lose my cool… and they were even worse with her because she refuses to angry about anything… which they would all take advantage of….

Now it has been 6 months? 7 months? and I havent used the phone # for that long and just want out of the contract…. or at the very least a new phone…. but Bell still keeps on taking the $60 a month regardless that we cant use it….

I renewed a 3-yrs contract with Rogers internet and cable when I lived in Ontario. I told the representative that I’ll be moving to Alberta in a couple months and she said I can simply call them to change of the address, that’s it! So I moved and called them, they said they have no service of internet and cable in Alberta at all and when I said I have to cancel they wanted to charge me penalty. After 1 hr negotiation, the girl finally find out that I don’t have to pay cuz they have no service. Remember, google is ur best friend and don’t simply trust what they tell you.

I too am having issues with Bell after being with them for 7 years, I used to be able to negociate with them before…. but now they just dont care and are not interested in loyalty anymore, so I have 2 lines with them and trying to figure out a way to get out of it. Bell never again!!!

ok so rogers has posted a bulletin that says the u.s ppu is changing to 1.45 cent/m its supposed to be new and simplified can i cancel because of this now im not sure what it was before but either way its a change to my account

When you call in to Rogers, it is likely that they will say you agreed changes in terms. At this point you can refer them to s. 7 of the Consumer Protection Act, 2002 (S.O. 2002, CHAPTER 30 Schedule A) which state that:

The substantive and procedural rights given under this Act apply despite any agreement or waiver to the contrary.

This does not constitute legal opinion. Do not rely on this information as it is merely my opinion and not legal advice.

My Fido phone was stolen 2 days after the 3 year term started (I had already had the phone for 6 months though, because my last Fido phone was garbage and they duped me into 3 years just to replace the last one), and when I’ve contacted them all they can tell me is that I either have to get a new phone with them (contract stacking, the original 3 years + the new 3 years no thank you), or pay $440 plus tax to buy out. I’m sitting here grieving over my lost phone and your only options are roping me in to your shit company for 6 years or charging me $500+ just to get away from you? I’ve viewed their whole “terms & conditions” page and unfortunately it hasn’t been changed since 2011. It also says “…we may change, at any time, any charges, features, content, functionality, structure or any other aspects of the Services, as well as any term or provision of the Agreement, upon notice to you. If you do not accept a change to the affected Services, your sole remedy is to terminate the affected Services provided under the Agreement, within 30 days of your receipt of our notice of change to the Services (unless we specify a different notice period), by providing us with advance notice of termination pursuant to Section 34. If you do not accept a change to these Terms, your sole remedy is to retain these Terms unchanged for the duration of the Commitment Period (as defined below), upon notice to us within 30 days of your receipt of our notice of change to these Terms.” and to be frank it is hard to make either heads or tails or it. I just really need to dip from this nonsense. Its not even that I am having poor service (which I wasn’t, though the bill rang in between $80-$180 a month) its that I have no service whatsoever and there is no way I am paying for something I don’t even have!

If you do get out of your contracts.. Buying a phone
Straight out and then going on a plan is what I did.
I bought my I phone and went on the same plan
Anyone with a contract is on, I just didn’t sign anything.
And at anytime if I don’t like my service I can leave
Without being charged for everything you can think of. it’s way better than pay as you go. Hope this helps!

Fido is HORRIBLE. Every single time I have called them I have spoken to the RUDEST customer service agents I have EVER spoken to from ANY company. One woman actually told me to shut up because I tried to explain to her that I had made a PAYMENT ARRANGEMENT with a previous agent that is clearly on her screen and Fido cancelled my service from non-payment TWO DAYS before my agreed upon day of PAYMENT ARRANGEMENT. This woman could not handle this concept and told me that I just had to pay my bill on time every month. If I didn’t – too bad, my service was cancelled. I told her that was ridiculous because what is the point of a PAYMENT ARRANGEMENT if nothing is ARRANGED? Finally she told me she would let it slide “this time” and reconnect my service without the charge but she could only do this twice a year so I couldn’t do it again until November.

I paid exactly what I said I would two days later.

What I find especially hilarious about Fido is that if you have ANY unpaid amount on your account, you cannot use pretty much all of the features on Fido’s website – including changing the address on your account. I moved about two months ago and because I have small carry over charges, I can’t change the address without calling in and talking to a horrible rep. Which I obviously have no plans on doing – they can chase me.

More so, FIDO DOLLARS. This is earned on PREVIOUS PAID BILLS. And yet you cannot access or use them if you have an unpaid balance (of which they always seem to put in the upcoming month on this month’s balance). I think I should be able to use them – I ALREADY earned them.

If you check the cancellation terms on Fido’s website you’ll see they’ve changed to go in line with the new CRTC laws. However, if you signed up with them before Jan 22nd, you’re still stuck with this contract and a possible $300.00 cancellation charge (and whatever else they decide to stick on there).

I’m trying to escape my Fido plan as well. I’ve been searching through their website and terms and conditions trying to find a way out without paying the exorbitant early cancellation fee. Is there any chance of them changing their terms soon so that I can refuse them and terminate the contract? How would I find out about a change? Will they inform me directly or do I have to hunt it down myself, hidden somewhere on the site or something?
Has anyone had any success with this?

Your best bet is to post your contract on a plan swapping site, like cellclients.com. You post your contract and if someone is interested in taking it over, they’ll message you. I’ve done this with cellclients before and it worked out pretty good. Costs $20 to post your contract, rather than paying a ton in cancellation fees.

About 6 months ago I go to Wind to get a cell phone I liked the idea of the Galaxy Nexus and they were one of the few providers that carried them. 40 bucks a month unlimited data, voice, text no contract 8 bucks a month for voice mail. HAHAHAHHAHAHAHHHAAH. $200 bucks down on the phone then 10 percent of the bill goes towards the $400 balance. I am married to them until the phone is paid off DOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOh on me. What really pisses me off is about a month later they offer 40 bucks a month no charge for voice mail and the phone for $50. Don’t get me going.

Remember the Customer is always right, when dealing with business. What a ha ha. I have had a Bell cell phone since 2001 and I complain regularly. No Service in my area. No service in my area. No service I tell Bell Mobility representatives. Sorry they tell me unfortunately we cannot do anything about that. I have a LEMON PHONE I tell the representative unfortunately we cannot do anything about that until you pay your bill off completely. Well how can I do that if my phone rates are ridiculously high and increasing, because now I have dropped calls. Unfortunately we don’t see anything says Bell representatives. I complained my phone doesn’t hang up after I hang up and finish my call. Unfortunately we cannot help you says the Bell representative, you must take the battery out. Now Bell tells me I have to pay $400.00 to get out of my contract. Unfortunately I learned Bell cannot charge more than $120.00 for getting out of your contract. You know what I say what contract I have not signed a life long contract to Bell Mobility. What Lemon Law, what Terms of Agreement did I sign in 2001 that says I have to pay for the rest of my life……..

I’m out of Bell as soon as my contract is over in February and I’m never looking back. Even their bundles aren’t worth it if I can go to Virgin and pay 25$ a month for 200 min, evenings, call display and unlimited text and photo msg.

there are SOO many scams in Bell. let me tell you some of the ones I’ve had the privelege of knowing:

firstly, when my phone broke the first time after warranty, I got a prepaid cheap phone and went to get it activated at the Bell location (rude customer service). They told me I could not use a prepaid phone with my plan and that I would not be able to activate this phone; they then showed me to display cases with phones for 150$+ (no thanks?)

guess what? You CAN activate prepaid phones with Bell; I did this over the phone.

Second thing that happens: my phone broke just now (sadly, but not surprised since it is Bell) and I tried to call them. They told me I could do a ‘hardware upgrade’ in which I’d have to follow up with another 3 year contract. I said ******* NO. But you know what’s funny? Bell used to give in-store credit for cells if you used them long enough.. i.e. 2 years gave you about 100$ on a new phone of your choice, without any contract extensions. I guess they changed that to ‘hardware update’ because providing people with a nice service that doesn’t skin their wallets dry is too much of a hassle for Bell.

Got an iphone 4s on contract for 3 years in Dec 2011 with Bell. Will be done with 2 years by the end of this year. I’m leaving the country indefinitely, any advice on how I can get out of my contract ?

I’m 6 months in to a 2 year contract with Telus and am paying $90+ a month :/ but now I’m going back to school and wont be able to afford to pay that much while in school.Does anyone know if Telus will
let me switch to a cheaper phone plan without charging me a contract termination fee or sign me up for another 2 year contact?